Cobblers will 'address' set-piece struggles as Curle backs Edmondson to score goals

Cobblers boss Keith Curle admits his side need to work on set-pieces, potentially a vital part of their armoury, after another blunt display at Blackpool in midweek.

Town, top scorers from set-pieces in League Two last season, have not scored direct from a dead ball situation since Alan Sheehan's free-kick found the net against Gillingham between Christmas and New Year.

It is an area of the game that Curle sees as vital but, with Bryn Morris and Joseph Mills now on duty at corners and free-kicks, his side have struggled to cause too many problems for opposition teams.

"We got into good crossing positions on Tuesday and we had a number of set-pieces but we're not getting on the end of them enough," Curle admitted.

"That's something we need to address and continue to work on. Some of our set-pieces, we've got good delivery but we're not hitting the markers and that's something which needs to be fine-tuned.

"That was evident with our first corner on Tuesday night when we went for the back-post run and it's a foot short of being a great move.

"But those are the fine margins and if you're going to miss it, miss it big and don't come up short. It's probably one we can't do for a couple of weeks now anyway!"

Town will also hope January signing Ryan Edmondson, brought in on loan from Leeds United, starts finding the net after failing to score in any of his three starts so far.

"Ryan will score goals and he will get opportunities to score goals," insisted Curle. "The pleasing thing is his mentality. It's very similar to a centre-forward that I played with in Steve Bull at Wolves. He had a fantastic attitude towards scoring goals.

"He had a reputation for scoring goals but he also missed a lot of chances, but his mindset and his mentality was that the next one would go in and that belief was part of his character and why he had so much success.

"It's similar with Ryan. He was unfortunate with the goal that was disallowed on Tuesday but in every game he's played he could have scored and that's encouraging - goals will come."