Manager Shaun Derry sent out an email to Notts County supporters ahead of this weekend's Meadow Lane encounter with Shrewsbury Town... Read it here...
In the words of Jimmy Greaves, “it’s a funny old game”. That’s certainly been true of my move into management and my return to Meadow Lane, but I wasn’t laughing on Saturday night.
It’s been a time of highs and lows, but we’re entering the real business end of the season now and we need more highs than lows if we’re to achieve our goal of staying in this division.
That’s what disappointed me on Saturday, that we didn’t maintain our high standards from the week before, because we simply cannot allow our performance levels to drop at any point from now until the end of the season.
I think a lot of people around the club have steered clear of mentioning relegation and that’s understandable, but there’s no hiding from it in reality, that is what we’re battling against.
There are no certainties in this game, the last few weeks have shown that. I don’t think anyone could have predicted some of the results that we’ve seen around the division lately, but that’s why we just have to remain focused on ourselves and concentrate on picking up as many points as we can.
Our destiny is in our hands, regardless of the permutations of the league table, because if we win all of our remaining games, we will stay up, there’s no doubt about that. I know that’s not going to happen but it shows that we do not have to rely on what happens elsewhere.
I don’t think many neutrals would have had us getting anything against Coventry City a couple of weeks ago, but we beat them 3-0, and it’s that level of performance that I’ll be expecting again this weekend when we’re back here at Meadow Lane.
One thing that hasn’t changed since my arrival as manager is the fact that we all need to be pulling in the same direction, at all levels of the club, going into every game from now until the end of the season believing that we can win and backing ourselves against any opposition.
This weekend gives us a real chance to lay down a marker for the remainder of the campaign, both on and off the pitch, thanks to the latest ticket offer that the Chairman and his Board have put in place.
It’s a great offer and I hope plenty of you take it up and get down to the Lane to cheer on the boys because we definitely need to make home advantage count and we need to start putting a bit of a run together to edge us clear of that bottom four in the coming weeks.
See you on Saturday
Shaun.
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