00:01Mark, defeat against West Ham in the National League Cup, but I'm guessing the real big positive tonight is Oli
00:05Harfield's return.
00:06Yeah, delighted for Oli to get back out on the pitch. It was a special occasion for him.
00:11He's worked incredibly hard and been so professional.
00:15I didn't know Oli really, you know, before we came in and just seeing him the last few months, his
00:19dedication.
00:20He's always in early, he's trying to do everything right to give himself the best chance of being out there.
00:25And I actually thought he did well for half an hour. He made good decisions on the ball.
00:29Showed good intensity in his play. So I was delighted for him to get back.
00:33And hopefully now we can just sort of manage him correctly.
00:36And obviously he's got to build his sort of, you know, match minutes up and be ready to go.
00:42But yeah, I think that was probably one of the pluses, definitely.
00:46Yeah, I mean, for someone who's been out for nearly two years, you know, he could have struggled to be
00:49up to speed, but he looked perfectly fine out there.
00:51Yeah, he's been back in training a couple of weeks. He's trained well.
00:54You know, as I say, he's very professional, tries to do everything correctly.
00:56And yeah, we're delighted for him.
00:59So let's, fingers crossed, he can stay injury free and hopefully work his way back into the team.
01:06Obviously the league's a priority, but you're not going to like losing any game, are you?
01:09So yeah, thoughts on the game itself?
01:11Yeah, I mean, you know, it's frustrating.
01:13Of course, you know, we don't want to lose.
01:15But it was, we looked very disjointed tonight and I think we sort of had a bit of a sort
01:23of mix and match team out there.
01:25I mean, we started with sort of Hakeem and Marcus Wiley sort of playing central midfield, you know, which, you
01:31know, is very unlikely to happen again.
01:33But we did pick up a few little bumps and bruises from Saturday's game against Halifax.
01:39And we obviously got to go again, a really important game against Solihull.
01:42And we tried to sort of get a competitive side out there, but it was difficult to try and get
01:48sort of round pegs in round holes, as it were.
01:51And obviously we've made substitutions after half an hour.
01:54And, you know, so it's never ideal when you're sort of approaching a game like that.
01:59It can be frustrating, this competition on that side of things.
02:03And today I think we just had to really look after sort of key players and sort of, you know,
02:09have more than one eye, shall we say, on Solihull Saturday.
02:12It's sort of the nature of this competition, isn't it?
02:14You can only make so many changes, can't you?
02:16And so with the injuries you've got, you've kind of got to manage that really carefully.
02:20Yeah, and we haven't got a huge squad.
02:21I think we've got about 21 players, you know, that we all do trust.
02:26But, yeah, you obviously, as we know, have to sort of make the four, play the four players that started
02:31the last game.
02:32So it does give you a few sort of headaches.
02:35And, yeah, perhaps we just haven't got quite a sort of big enough squad to sort of be competing on
02:41every single front.
02:42So we did have to prioritise.
02:44And, you know, we don't like doing that because the few hundred people that came tonight
02:49sort of want to try and see the best version of all the shot.
02:52But, you know, hopefully they understand that we do have to prioritise.
02:55And we've made a very good start in the league.
02:57You know, we're happy with how we've been going.
03:00And, you know, we have to look after a few lads.
03:03You know, we don't want to be picking up two or three silly injuries tonight
03:06and then be going to Solihull on Saturday, you know, with not full strength side.
03:11So, yeah, that was the sort of thinking.
03:13It was a few sort of square pegs in round holes tonight.
03:17But I thought young Riley, you know, from the academy came in and acquitted himself really well.
03:22We were able to get Joe Lewis Evans out there for an hour today.
03:25Jacob Borgnis sort of played 90 minutes, having missed the last three fixtures.
03:30I think it was good for him to get 90 minutes and sort of maybe blow a few cobwebs away.
03:36Alphonso Tenconi sort of as well was working his socks off up front on his own there.
03:40So that would be good for him.
03:41But, yeah, obviously, you know, like, yeah, ideally we'd like to sort of be a bit more competitive tonight.
03:47But credit to West Ham, you know, they've got some good lads.
03:50They, you know, you could see that they were a team that sort of knew what they were doing.
03:55And on tonight, we were a bit of a team that were very disjointed.
03:59And I think you could see that throughout the game.
04:01But hopefully we've got through with no injuries.
04:05That's the main thing.
04:06Yeah, I guess you just sort of have to count, you know, see how everyone sort of recovers and just
04:09sort of see how they are really.
04:10Yeah, I don't think we've got anything serious.
04:12I think Kiki just had a bit of a tight calf.
04:16Connor was, you know, just a little bit tight from the week.
04:18And so I don't think we've got like any major sort of headaches that we've picked up from Saturday.
04:23But, you know, we just wanted to be careful.
04:25And there's no point sort of risking anything at this stage.
04:30So hopefully we'll have, you know, almost a fully fit squad to choose from from Saturday, fingers crossed.
04:37I guess one negative also, Brodie Pitts sending off.
04:40I mean, did you sort of see it?
04:41Yeah, I didn't see it.
04:42But the referee said to me that he sent him off for a punch.
04:45If that is the case, you know, that's obviously unacceptable.
04:48That's poor discipline.
04:49So we'll have a look on that.
04:51And, you know, we'll obviously deal with that in-house and speak to Brodie.
04:54I haven't seen the incident back yet.
04:57But the referee said that he felt it was a clear sort of punch off the ball, which obviously, if
05:03that is the case, is unacceptable.
05:05Really positive in the league, though.
05:07He's had another great performance and win on Saturday.
05:09You know, 11 points from six games.
05:10He really started well.
05:11And, you know, look to build, you know, looking ahead now to the trip to Sully Hall on Saturday.
05:15Certainly are.
05:16We're going to look forward to it.
05:18I think we've been very solid.
05:20You can see the work ethic from the lads in the league games.
05:23We have worked hard.
05:25So I just touched on it there.
05:26But I think we've got the best defensive record in the league alongside Hartleport at the moment.
05:31And, you know, that's something to be proud of because I'm a big sort of one of my sayings, and
05:36the lads will probably laugh, is, you know, zeros and ones against gives you a great chance.
05:40I mean, you ain't going to win games of football conceding twos and threes all of the time.
05:44As we suggest, as we have tonight.
05:46So we're very proud of how sort of solid we've been.
05:49We've got to keep that going.
05:51We've got to keep our work ethic very high because I think if we do step off of it, you
05:56know, without being sort of disrespectful to the players, I don't think we're good enough to sort of play at
06:0150, 60 percent.
06:03There's not many teams that are.
06:04But, you know, we base a lot of our work on our intensity and our running power.
06:09And, you know, hopefully come Saturday we'll be right back on it and trying to pick up three points in
06:14the league.
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