Calderwood calls on Cobblers to lay down promotion marker at Exeter

Colin Calderwood believes Cobblers can lay down another marker to show they are serious promotion contenders when they travel to Exeter City next week.
Cobblers assistant boss Colin CalderwoodCobblers assistant boss Colin Calderwood
Cobblers assistant boss Colin Calderwood

Town have enjoyed a free week and are without a game this weekend as it is the FA Cup second round, but they are quickly back on the Sky Bet League Two treadmill on Tuesday when they make the long trip to Devon (ko 7.45pm).

They go into that clash off the back of a 10-day break from games and in second place in the table following their hard-fought 1-0 win over Leyton Orient last Saturday.

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That was an eye-catching result against an in-form side and promotion rival, and assistant manager Calderwood wants more of the same at St James Park - making it clear the result is all-important, as it was in a scrappy win over the Os.

And things could well be working in Town’s favour too.

While the stretched Cobblers players have been recharging their batteries, and injured players have had extra time to shake off knocks, Exeter have been hard at it.

They had to play their rescheduled FA Cup first round replay against Bradford City on Tuesday night, which they won 2-1 to set up a second round trip to Cambridge United on Saturday.

Looking ahead to the Exeter game, Calderwood said: “This is very similar to the Leyton Orient game in terms of a marker of what we can achieve.

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“We want to take something, and hopefully everything, from the game.

“I was going to say as long as the performance is good we’ll be happy, but I don’t really believe that. We have to go and get points.

“We have to stop the teams around about us, and enhance any gap that we may have at the minute from eight or ninth, to fifth or sixth, etc.

“We have to have a better run than we have had so far this season to maintain a challenge, and we have now had a couple of wins in a row. We now want to get another.”