TT BLOG

Clive Hayward – @Byehorse

Clive blogs about Paul Wotton’s latest presser

We were back in the Dave Thomas Media Suite at Plainmoor for the weekly Q&A with Paul Wotton. The room is currently doubling as a storeroom for United’s new Christmas jumpers, and the stockpile is extensive!

INJURIES AND AVAILABILITY

Just for once, the news is almost uniformly good.

Nobody picked up an injury at Chelmsford last Saturday. Ed Palmer has recovered from his hammy and will be in the squad against Tonbridge Angels. Munashe Sundire and Cody Cooke have both been “running hard” in training this week. The mood music around Cookie suggests that we may well see him with his boots on at Totton in a fortnight.

The two current loan signings Sonny Sharples and Kieran Wilson have bedded in well. We have them until January 4^th and January 16^th respectively, and the Manager said he’s likely to try to extend both stays.

On Wilson: “Gary Caldwell (Exeter manager) loves him, and you can see why.”

On Sharples:

“We haven’t seen a lot of (him) but that’s because of the form of Dan Hayfield and Sonny Blu Lo-Everton, but in training he’s a really good football player. I like him a lot.”

TONBRIDGE ANGELS

Although he acknowledged that United will start as favourites, he was clear that he’s not expecting them to be a pushover:

“We can’t just sit there and go: “we’ve won 5 on the trot now, that’s perfect…we can take our foot of the gas and it’ll all be ok cos it won’t. You’ve got to keep on doing it & doing it & doing it.”

“They’ve got good away form- but we’ve got good home form.”

TOUCHLINE BAN

That marvellous evening against Woking had a sting in the tail. The Fourth Official took umbrage at the Boss’ comments to him about the amount of time added on at the end of our 3-2 win. The outcome is that Paul will have to serve a one match touchline ban. He has taken it on the chin (to coin a phrase):

“The players are made up!”

“I got reported”

“It was my fault”

He’s not sure where he’s going to be able to watch the game yet. Bristow’s is his preference, although one certainty is that Michael Westcott won’t be alongside him. They sat together last time, but the Chairman has made it very clear that once was enough!

RESILIANCE IN THE SQUAD

He pointed out that, for him, it’s easy to check whether someone is a good player and is likely to fit into a pattern of play, but the harder part of recruitment is checking their character. We hear this from managers a lot, but clearly, it’s important. Wotton praised the resilience within the squad:

“Togetherness is easy when you’re winning games. When you’re not, that’s when true character shows through…and being bullet-proof. One thing about this current group- a little like last year’s group but more evident for me this season- is that they deal with disappointment very well.”

He stressed the importance of getting over disappointment very quickly, because it is a part of football and life: he light-heartedly pointed out that it’s easier to get over having a bad game than running out of milk!

Later, he discussed the importance of the big crowds that have been a feature of the last 2 seasons at Plainmoor. He said he feels we have players who can handle that, and rise to it:

“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having 3 or 4 players with an ego. I don’t think that’s a bad thing at all. Sometimes egos need fuelling and when you’re doing well in front of 3-3,500 fans your ego inflates.”

JORDAN YOUNG

“It was a hell of a strike Saturday.”

“Technically he is as good as I have coached”

“He works very hard. He gets through a lot of distance in a game and defensively he’s always back doubling up as well. At the moment he’s in a great run of form and long may it continue.”

CHELMSFORD

Dave Thomas asked about cleanos (obviously the great man didn’t use that phrase!).

Paul:

“To get a clean sheet at Chelmsford was excellent because I don’t think there will be many teams that go there and do that. They’ve got a big attacking threat. First half we weren’t really in their half but it was comfortable. It wasn’t an onslaught. It wasn’t wave after wave.”

“They had a corner with about 30 seconds to go and I turned to Mikey and said: “Get in 0-0 at half time and we’ll win this.”

He was of course right, as United came much more into the game in the second half and stunned the upwardly mobile Clarets with two strikes of the highest class.

OUR RIGHT BACKS

There was praise for Jordan Thomas, and his mental toughness:

“I’ve got a lot of faith in him”

“What I will say about JT is he’s incredibly strong mentally. He found himself out of the team earlier in the season and he doubled down on his work ethic in training, He worked harder than ever before, He never came knocking on my door. He was exemplary in his attitude, waited for his chance and he’s taken it- and that’s exactly how I think football players should react.”

Denzel Acheampong kept a few of us travelling fans company on the first part of the train ride home last Saturday. He came across as humble, and a nice young man.

Paul agrees that it’s important for his players to come across well:

“I think that’s important as a human being. I’d like to think I’ve bought my children up that way as well, not just in a football environment. You don’t want your players to be talked about as egotistical or having no time for people. We haven’t done anything: we’ve got no right to be big-time. Humility is an important trait in people: it’s a good trait in players. Humility: I like it. I’m not into banging doors down and shouting and screaming when you’ve won a game because we haven’t done anything. We’ve only played 20 games.”

COYY

Clive