Britton Concerned With Injury List

A 1-0 defeat Bromley in the Blue Square Bet South on Saturday left Bath City boss Adie Britton downhearted at his....

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Published 10th September 2012

Adie Britton

....side's performance and concerned at his squad's constant struggle with injury. City went down to a 10th minute header from Pierre Joseph-Dubois and have now lost three games on the trot away from home in the league.

"Make no mistake, this was a poor performance," said Britton afterwards.

"I didn't think we were at all incisive. We tried our best with the resources we had, to play to a shape, but we failed to do that.

"We just didn't really have the tools in our locker to hurt them. I am afraid you look round the side and there are not many that come out with any credit.

"The most disappointing thing was that the goal came from work by the right back. We had talked in training about the front boys not letting the full backs out and yet that's exactly what happened for Bromley's goal.

"I was disappointed with the front boys. We had a few chances but it was a bit of a slog for Charlie Griffin without a lot of support .

"Kurtis Guthrie had such a good first couple of games, scoring four but I don't think that has helped him a lot. Since then he thinks it's easy and does not have to work hard. He was not really in the game today.

"We made changes at half-time. We brought on Luke Cummings to give us some width. Unfortunately Luke struggled to get past their left-back so not many crosses came into the box. The other change we made was Lamar Powell coming on. He has not done much training and he's slightly asthmatic so he was struggling with that and we had to replace him."

Performance apart, City's other big problem has been a succession of injuries. In their last two matches they have been forced into early, first-half, substitutions. On Saturday, Britton's chosen starting XI did not even make it that far.

"We lost Kerry Morgan before the game," the manager confirmed. "They had watered the pitch just before we started our warm-up. Kerry slipped and twisted his ankle.

"We brought back Jim Rollo, who has been out for a couple of weeks with injury, and we would have expected him to only play for 60 minutes. But when you lose a player before the start, and you then have to make changes to keep the shape working, he had to play the full 90. Danny Ball, who's only 20, has played a lot of games recently and he looked tired. Noah Keats was fantastic at Salisbury but today had little in him.

"Hopefully not having a midweek game means we may get a couple of players back, such as Josh Low or Aaron Brown, and possibly Joe Burnell. That's our first goal but I think we will have to use the loan market because we have to try and get a couple of experienced players in.

"It's great the experience the young lads are getting. However, you can drop two or three into a side but you cannot have six or seven out there all under 22. It's all a bit too soon for them, but needs must at the moment and we have to play them.

"Our time will come again and as a club we have to find a different way. We have to go down the youth road but it's happening a lot quicker than I anticipated and we really don't have much choice.

"We are very lucky to have the young players we have and I just hope people will stick with them, but at the moment it's a revolution not evolution."

[Source: Bath Chronicle]