Nolan to work on Cobblers' final third play after another home blank
Kevin Nolan admits Cobblers need to improve their attacking play after drawing another home blank – their third in a row – against Lincoln City.
Town had more of the play throughout Saturday’s League One contest at Sixfields, edging both territory and possession, but that did not result in many, if any, clear-cut opportunities. They had just three shots on target, all of which were comfortably saved by Imps goalkeeper Zach Jeacock.
Creating chances and scoring goals has become a regular problem this season. Since their 3-0 victory over Crawley Town in late October, Cobblers have scored just eight goals in 14 league games.
Nolan was generally positive about Saturday’s performance and he’s confident his team are heading in the right direction, but finding a way to open up opposition and score more goals must be a priority if they are to climb away from trouble.
"This was my first full week and I thought it was a lot better in terms of getting into positive positions within the game but then i just felt the lads panicked a bit and they got carried away and made the wrong decisions,” said Nolan.
"But that’s going to happen and what I’ve said to them is that they have to keep doing it and keep training and we’ll work with them. As they start getting into those positions more, they’ll start taking a bit more time and it’ll calm down and it’ll come together.”
Cobblers were edging a tight game when Tendayi Darikwa struck late in the first half for Lincoln and that seemed to take the wind out of the home side’s sails, at least until half-time.
Nolan added: "We did lose our way a bit after the goal and that’s something we will address this week because when you go 1-0 down it’s important you recover and go back to what you were doing.
"We need to bring a calmness to the lads and it’s important to be clear in the head and I think they are much clearer now than they were three weeks ago. We passed the ball much better and we moved it well at times but we have to do better when we get into the final third.
"We got to the final third quite easily at times and we did it really well but we didn’t put enough balls in the box and we didn’t make their goalkeeper work as much as I would have liked.
"The lads have taken on a lot of information but I’ve been really impressed by how they’ve done it. But we are getting there, slowly but surely, and if we can keep building on this, I’m certain results will change pretty soon.”