Curle not 'jumping for joy' but sees positive signs from improving Cobblers

He might not be 'jumping for joy' just yet but Cobblers boss Keith Curle is encouraged by the progress his side are making after reaching the halfway point of the season this week.

One point and one goal from two away games does not sound a particularly impressive return but Town, buoyed by four January signings, offered promising signs in their performances at both Lincoln and Fleetwood.

With relegation rivals Wigan Athletic visiting the PTS this weekend, they must now convert those improved performances into points to move away from trouble at the bottom of League One.

“At this time of the season results are obviously important," admitted Curle. "But, as a coach, you also want to build momentum and build that upward curve and performances within results are very important.

“I said to the players that the performance (on Tuesday) was another tick in the box for what we want to do. Are there things we can still tidy up on? Definitely. Are there things we need to improve on? Definitely.

“But the players are on-board in terms of what we’re trying to do and there’s an identity growing. You're not going to start jumping for joy after one point from two games but I think the performances in those two games gave us lots of positives.

“There have been a lot of changes and to continue the momentum, we need to be on our game for every match and every training session and the players need to keep taking on-board information from the coaches because that’s what good sides do.

"We have had limited training time but we've been doing work with the analyst with the new signings to show what's needed from them and how we see them integrating into the group.

"We've brought in good players with good principles and good foundations and they understand what we need them to do. The work we're doing with them on the training ground is paying off."

Whilst others may play up the importance of tomorrow's fixture against Wigan, Curle will not place too much pressure on his side to get the win, especially given there are still so many games to be played this season.

“Every game we play now is a big game,” he added. “Lincoln last Saturday was a big game and we put in a good performance.

“Yes, they are top of the league and things didn’t go our way on the day, but the level of the performance shows we are on the right track.

“The same goes for Tuesday. People might say ‘how can you be happy with just a point?’ but take a look at the performance.

“We finished the game strong and that shows the confidence and the understanding from within the group and I think the subs made a very good impact, so it ticks another box.”