Gaffer happy with fight despite League Cup loss
Graham Turner was pleased with the overall performance in spite of his side’s 3-1 loss to a “very good” Bolton outfit in the Capital One Cup first round tie at the Greenhous Meadow.
Aaron Wildig scored Town’s first goal of the 13-14 campaign within three minutes of the visitors taking the lead although goals either side of half-time gave the Trotters enough of an advantage to see out the win.
“I’m feeling disappointment with the way we conceded the goals,” said Turner.
“I think its encouraging the way we stuck at it and the way we played at times though. We got ourselves in good positions and had several good shooting opportunities that we missed the target with, but overall we’ve stuck to the game plan and we’ve tried to work the ball into good areas.
“I think they’ve had to work hard to counter us, so I think we’ve stretched them at times and obviously in their penalty area we needed more of a cutting edge.
“Bolton are a very good side. I know they made some changes, but they’ve got some good quality and, as I wrote in my programme notes, they’ve got a very good squad of players.”
It was quite literally adding insult to injury in the case of John Marsden and Jon Taylor, who both limped off in the defeat.
“I think it’s been confirmed he’s [Marsden] broken a bone in his foot. He’s been off to hospital, so that’s obviously a blow to us.
“With Akwasi being out with his hamstring and then John Marsden going down, and Jon Taylor has turned his ankle as well its tough. When it goes wrong, it goes wrong but we’ll patch everybody up and get them ready for Leyton Orient.
That fixture at Orient comes around quickly on Saturday and Turner is keen to keep the optimism and confidence high heading into the game.
“We’ve just been talking to the players about how we approach it now and keeping the belief in the way we’re trying to play.
“They’ve worked very hard in the game tonight, we looked a fit side and we looked to have a good purpose about us and what we need is for the players not to be knocked back too far in terms of confidence because of tonight’s result.”
Watch the full interview with GT on SHREWS PLAYER