Dragons boss Little: We won’t give up hope

Mar 31 2008 by Phil Blanche, Western Mail

WREXHAM boss Brian Little took the Dragons’ latest defeat on the chin and insisted that his players had not given up hope of avoiding relegation.

Little’s next task is to lift his team for tomorrow’s visit to Mansfield – who are only a point above Wrexham – but of more concern is the eight-point gap to Notts County in 22nd spot.

“Talking with the players in the dressing room, I have told them we can win two games in a row, which is something we need to do,” he said.

“We have had a good talk in there about what we are doing and what we need to do.

“There is really only one way to approach it and that’s to go for it.”

Little claimed his players never really recovered after conceding the opening goal in the final play of the first half.

“In most of our games there have been defining moments and here it came 15 seconds before half-time,” he added.

“I felt that we were cruising in the first half. We were easily matching them, keeping them out, although they had a couple of corners that we were a little bit edgy about.

“But then we made the mistake of fouling with just seconds to go.

“The only place they were going to put the ball was in the box and then we let the marker go, so we made two very silly mistakes in a short period of time.

“There was no need to foul, they were going nowhere and we should have got to half time at 0-0. The momentum might then have been with us to go on and do well.

“The elements were a little bit in our favour in the second half and to have gone in at 0-0 would have been psychologically in our favour.

“But that changed and we knew we had to get back into the game.

“Any manager will tell you that to concede then will always change your team talk. Ours went right out of the window and everyone was down, so it was now a case of lifting them.

“It was a big moment for us and, to be honest, I don’t think we really recovered from it.

“I can’t criticise the effort and commitment, but again we are our own worst enemies at times.”

Little admitted he was glad to see the back of Greater London this season, the Barnet result coming on the back of similar outcomes at Dagenham & Redbridge and Brentford.

“I’m disappointed not to have won here, although I accept that in the second half they had more chances to score when we got a bit ragged,” he said.

“But I keep going back to that goal before half-time because, although we had a couple of little scares, we also had the better chances.

“To concede like that can knock you to pieces, especially when you are bottom and not winning games. It knocks the stuffing out of you.

“Our last few trips to this part of the world have all had the same result so it’s made it an unhappy hunting ground.”

Wrexham moved closer to the Football League trapdoor as Little gambled on a 3-4-3 formation – with Paul Hall, Drewe Broughton and Michael Proctor in attack – with no recognised ball-winner in midfield.

Jeff Whitley was left kicking his heels on the bench until the last 20 minutes and the pacy Barnet pair of Albert Adomah and Anthony Thomas flourished.

Ismail Yakubu headed home Nicky Nicolau’s free-kick at the end of the first half and then Wales Under-21 striker Adam Birchall doubled Barnet’s lead on 51 minutes.

But Wrexham were back in it when on-loan striker Broughton looped a header over home goalkeeper Lee Harrison.

The goal proved a false dawn, though, as the home side restored their two-goal cushion within the space of seven minutes.

Thomas did the damage when he thrust forward unchallenged and hit a low cross-cum-shot that was turned in by an unmarked Nicolau.

Once again, Wrexham had been punished by poor marking and it was to cost them as Simon Spender’s 66th-minute strike would have been good enough to take them off the bottom.