Town boss preparing for difficult Accrington test
Manager Micky Mellon believes Accrington Stanley will provide Shrewsbury Town with another tough test in the Sky Bet League 2 fixture on Tuesday night.Town take on James Beattie's side at the Greenhous Meadow (7.45pm kick-off) looking to continue their perfect home start to the season following victories over Blackpool and Tranmere Rovers in the last two games.
Rovers threatened to inflict a first defeat on Town at the weekend before late goals from Andy Mangan and Mickey Demetriou gave Micky's side a 2-1 win.
And the Town boss is preparing for another difficult encounter against Stanley, despite the Lancashire side losing all three of their opening games so far this season.
"It's another really tough game," said Micky.
"Accrington are always a club with a group of players that fight very hard, so we'll need to be at our best again to try and get something from the game.
"They have so much spirit and they'll be coming here to try and get a result.
"I'm realistic enough to know that you've got to put in good performances to win games.
"I don't come to any game thinking we can be below par and get a result. We've got to be at our best all the time."
Micky pointed to the fact that Town will play their fourth game in ten days when they take on Accrington as to how important preparation will be.
"It's such a difficult league and it's relentless at the minute with the Saturday-Tuesday fixtures," said Micky.
"You've got to be psychologically and physically ready to get anything in this league."
Defender Demetriou popped up with an injury-time winner for Town against Tranmere on Saturday when making his first appearance of the season.
And Micky has highlighted the importance of players from all positions in the Shrewsbury squad pitching in with goals this season.
"You need people to pitch in because we'll be in situations like that again," he said.
"Hopefully people can help us out, and I'm really pleased because it's good for the health of the group that all the squad are pitching in.
"The way the team has started the season means there's not been opportunities to get lads in, but when they come in we told them to be ready because we're going to need them.
"I don't have a team. I have a group of players who play first-team football.
"They've all been brought here to play.
"With the amount of games we've got, it's going to be difficult to keep knocking out those kind of performances, so we'll probably have to look into the squad ahead of the game.
"It will be four games in ten days, so we'll have a look and maybe freshen things up.
"We know there will be different challenges every week, but if we keep believing in what we do then we'll be fine."