Retford United manager Paul Ward wants to the same performance he got from his players in the second half at Tadcaster in today’s local derby with Worksop Town
Paul Ward is demanding a repeat of the second half performance at Tadcaster Albion from his Retford United players for the local derby with Worksop Town in the Toolstation NCEL Premier Division today.
Retford were beaten 5-1 at Tadcaster in midweek – a scoreline which could have been a lot worse as Ward’s men were losing 5-0 after 30 minutes.
Ward said: “We regrouped in the second half by making a couple of substitutions and a couple of tactical changes in hope of nullifying them.
“I think the second half was more a case of them dropping it ten or 15 percent, but us improving 100%.
“The one thing I asked them for was a bit of character and it was a matter of pride.
“At 5-1 down at half-time it would have been easy to fold.
“But you look at that second half performance. We had a missed penalty, David Buck went through and could have scored and then the double save off the ‘keeper from Lee Hutchinson.
“The message is reproduce the second half.
“We’re going into Saturday against Worksop and they shouldn’t need raising for that.
“We have to start sharp.”
Ward admitted it was men against boys during the opening half at Taddy and he added: “It was a proverbial game of two halves.
“We were so slow out of the blocks and we conceded a really ridiculous goal after one minute.
“That kind of set the tone for the whole of the first half.
“I said to them after the game that we started three or four games really sloppily this season and found ourselves a goal or two down and you’re chasing the game.
“It was always going to be a hard task enough going up to Tadcaster.
“I said to Paul (Marshall) last season that they were the best team up had come up against and I felt they should have won the Division.
“I saw on Tuesday night that it is going to be no different this season.
“The first half was just a lesson and after the first goal we lost our heads.
“The more ragged we got, the more the quality players can exploit you and that’s what they did.”
Retford have had an indifferent start to the season, but Ward is hopeful of having a good campaign.
Ward, who has previously managed Hatfield Main and Harrogate Town, was promoted from coach to first team manager at Retford in the summer.
He said: “To a certain extent it is a rebuilding job.
“We have probably one of the smallest budgets in the league and we have a group of players who are punching above their weight a little bit in terms of where the finances are concerned.
“We have a good group and we can certainly match the top teams on the day.
“Even though we have one of the lowest budgets, I still feel confident we can have a top half finish.
“We’ll aim as high as we can.”