Gaffer looks ahead to Valley Parade trip
Shrewsbury Town Boss Paul Hurst is urging his players to put their Wembley disappointment behind them when they take on Bradford City on Thursday evening.
The game at Valley Parade is live on Sky Sports and Town will be looking to get back to winning ways after Sunday’s 1-0 defeat to Lincoln City.
“I’m pleased that we’ve got a game and it’s on TV, so we know there’s another national audience to watch us”, said Paul.
“For me, I want them to show that Sunday wasn’t a true reflection of how they’ve performed for large parts of the season, hence the reason we find ourselves in such a good position in the league with a big point’s total.
“I want to get back at it because whatever we do, until we play a game again you’re not going to get that feeling away, so I’m hoping that we can put on a good show.
“While I’ve always said that at this time in the season results are the most important, what I am looking for, 100%, is a better performance. Whether or not we get both we will see, but I certainly expect the players to put on a better show and impress people with the absolute basics we demand.”
At one stage Bradford appeared to be in with a good chance of promotion, but just one win since early January has seen them fall down into the bottom-half of League One. However, Bradford beat Town earlier in the season and Paul doesn’t believe they have become a bad team over night.
“One thing that is difficult in terms of preparation and has become apparent having analysed them is that they’ve changed system quite a lot recently", Hurst said.
“Some of that’s dictated to by performance on the day, some of it’s down to the opposition and trying to find that formula that fits with the players available to Simon (Grayson) at this present time.
“I’m not entirely sure how they are going to go. I’ve perhaps got an idea of what they might lean towards, but I can’t say that with any certainly because they’ve at least played three different systems in the not too distant past.
“What I would say is that they have got a good squad. I look at their bench when they had the disappointment at the weekend and I could see a lot of those coming into the side, and I think he’s already alluded to the fact that there will be changes.”