Tranmere Rovers manager Micky Mellon wants a response from his players ahead of this weekend’s trip to Newport County in Sky Bet League Two and expects a tough battle with the Exiles.
Rovers saw their seven-match winning run end on Tuesday night when Callum Lang’s brace earned Oldham Athletic a 2-0 win at Boundary Park.
However, TRFC remain fifth in the fourth-tier and are four points from third-placed Bury, as they prepare for Saturday’s away day in South-East Wales against Michael Flynn’s County.
And Mellon remains positive about what Rovers can do this season, and the Scot hopes that his squad can reach the required “levels” of performance at Rodney Parade.
Mellon said: “We’re very positive about what’s going on, I don’t take anything for granted. We have to try and continually work hard and understand what the platform was and the levels of work-rate that we were doing in order to find that formula that got you results.
“You have got to continue to try and hit those levels to give yourselves a good chance. There are levels that need to be met in order to give you a good chance of winning games.
“We have to show those performances and hit that form all of the time, and that’s what gets us the success here, we know that the levels are, and we know the areas that we didn’t hit from the last game and we are very keen that the players know that.
“The stakes are very, very high and everybody knows what they are fighting for.
“We do what we always do and win, lose or draw, we will comb over performances and there’s things that we need to improve on that has brought us success then we will have meetings at get back on the grass.
“We don’t get too up and too down, we just move on and try and learn and find out why we have won and why we have lost, we’ve had a good meeting and we’ll do things our way.
“We are trying to keep it under control, trying to concentrate on performance and where we are, and we’ll always try and do that.
“At this stage of the season with six games to go, the games are very emotional and tough, and the value of three points is very raw, so I expect that type of game, a real battle.
“We won’t look for any excuses, we’ll be going down there, in whatever environment and situation we’ll be prepared to adapt to whatever they are in order to try and get a performance and get a result.”
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