Steven Schumacher believes Wanderers will be out to right a couple of wrongs when they take on play-off rivals Stockport County on Saturday, writes Pete Oliver.
The Whites will be bidding to make amends for their worst defeat of the season when they were on the end of a 5-0 beating at Stockport in November.
And the head coach feels his players will also want to make up for the disappointment of their mid-week loss at Bristol Rovers which brought Wanderers only their second defeat in eight league games under Schumacher’s watch.
“It's against a team who are in the top six, who've been flying this season. It should be an exciting afternoon and it's going up against a good team, so we need to make sure that we're at it,” said Schumacher ahead of the lunch-time showdown at the Toughsheet Community Stadium (KO 12.30pm).
“They had a really good result against us early in the season, which we'll want to try and put right as well. It's never easy losing any game by five goals, especially when it's against a local rival. It's not a nice place to be, so I'm sure the players will want to put that right and also put it right from Tuesday night, really.
“We felt on Tuesday that we let points slip, when some of our performance was really good. We were dominant for the first half and should have been ahead by at least one goal, and then the game was a little bit scrappy in the second half, so I think the players will want to put that right as well.
“That was our game in hand and we missed out on taking any points, so we'll want to take points from this one on Saturday, definitely.”
The end of Wanderers’ unbeaten seven-match league run thanks to a late Bristol Rovers’ goal saw them stay sixth in the table, one place and two points behind a Stockport side beaten just twice in the league since Boxing Day.
Shumacher’s men have 10 games to go and the boss believes bouncing back with a repeat of the kind of form his side has shown since his arrival at Wanderers at the end of January can keep them firmly in the promotion hunt ahead of a fortnight’s break for international action.
“The run we've been on has been excellent and if we can put a similar run together in the next eight games or nine games, or whatever it is since the Reading game (his first), with a similar sort of points-tallying outcome then we won't be far off what we want to achieve,” added Schumacher, who confirmed that defender George Johnstone will again be sidelined with a hamstring injury.
“So that's the message to the lads. We’re gutted from Tuesday night, but it's okay, it's just another game, and we try and put it right to the weekend.
“If we can go up against a rival and we can get the better of them and go above them in the league, then it gives us a huge boost going into the international break.”
Watch Schumacher’s full pre-match interview on Wanderers TV