Exeter City manager Paul Tisdale's thoughts on Exeter City 2 Bristol Rovers 0
Exeter City manager Paul Tisdale said he was generally very pleased with his side’s performance as they beat Bristol Rovers 2-0 at St James Park in their second pre-season game.Tisdale named a strong starting XI for the first half – which he admitted is somewhere very close to the team he is thinking of naming for the opening match of the season against Blackpool – before giving some inexperienced players some minutes on the pitch after the break.
“As a starting point it was a good one,” said Tis. It was purposeful, focussed and I thought it was appropriate for what I was asking for, which was a serious start.
“I thought the first half display had some real quality in there. There are bits that I need to work on to make it more effective and that will all be about teamwork.
“The second group, I thought had great teamwork and just lacked a bit of quality in that final part. They just rushed it a little bit. They were a bit nervous, but that is to be expected from a totally young group – it was almost like an under-21 team. So, generally, I was very pleased.”
Lee Holmes helped set up the opening goal for Ryan Harley, whose close range shot deflected past Bristol keeper Will Puddy, and then fed Ollie Watkins for the second goal of the match with a good reverse pass.
Watkins, who partnered new signing Robbie Simpson up front, also had a couple of other efforts at goal that went just wide.
Tisdale admitted that the side that started the match was close to the one he was thinking of naming for Blackpool.
“Absolutely,” he said. “I don’t want to try and be creative for the sake of it. The players are good players. They can make things happen and sometimes you don’t need to be too manipulative with it. You need to just focus on one or two bits of teamwork, which they will be asked to do and let them get on with it. There is not too much for me to meddle with, I don’t think.”
“They have all got the ability to do things, but sometimes less is more,” added Tis. “We need to be all doing things at the same time and just be in the right positions. We haven’t got to be stunningly creative all the time. We have got to make sure, every now and then, we have got enough to do that, and we showed that. The rest of the time we have got to be on the same page and in sync. We shouldn’t be trying too much, because when it comes to the point around the box we have got those players that can do something. We haven’t got to overdo it.”
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