Chris Herbert has challenged his players to bounce back from a disappointing result against Winsford United, as the Greens begin their FA Vase campaign on Saturday against Prestwich Heys.
Humbled by a recently promoted Winsford outfit on Saturday, Herbert spoke of his frustration in the levels of performance shown.
“We have been very good until Saturday, but that performance was unacceptable for myself, Steve and the coaching staff.
“We expect better, I can accept losing to a bit of magic or a bit of hard luck, but there is no excuse in the way we had no energy or effort from a glut of our lads.
“The bare minimum we expect is 100% from every player. If we do that our quality will shine through, but we need to be prepared to do the ugly stuff first and win our individual battles, which until Saturday we have done very well.
“If we have to win ugly to get that in to the lads then so be it.
“There is going to be changes and we are hoping for a couple to come through the door before the weekend that will definitely improve us and I’m sure the fans will be happy with.”
Saturday’s opponents Prestwich have previous history against 1874 in this competition, eliminating the Greens at this stage once before. Herbert spoke of the importance of the competition to him and his side ahead of kick off, but warned that Prestwich will be a tricky opposition.
“Obviously our main objective is to try and get out of the league we are in, but we want to go as far as we can in every competition we are in and we will go as strong as we possibly can.
“They are a strong team and have had a pretty much same start as us. They have recruited very well pre-season and they will keep getting better.
“If we perform like we did Saturday we will be on the end of a similar result. But we have been in Tuesday and Thursday preparing for it. So, we will have no excuses as coaching staff, or as players.
“We always try and take the excuses away from the players, but we will also have to take blame on Saturday as we pick the team, so selection wise we got it completely wrong because the score line tells us that.
“We will be back to ourselves on Saturday and we will be prepared for anything that will be thrown at us.
“It is very important after such a poor performance at the weekend that the fans stick together and back the lads and push them on to a win. Let us worry about putting right last Saturday.
“The lads know what it means to our loyal fans, and it’s on us to give our fans something to cheer on and celebrate.”