MARK Fell has called on his side to put right the wrongs of what he describes as the worst performance of his Nelson reign.
The Admirals go into a North West Counties League Premier Division derby at home to Padiham tonight on the back of back-to-back defeats.
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But whereas Fell had no complaints with the performance in last Wednesday’s 2-1 loss at bitter rivals Colne, he was far from happy with what he saw in Saturday’s 3-0 reverse at Cammell Laird.
The Nelson boss said: “I thought we played really well against Colne. We conceded in the 95th minute and lost when I could make a good argument that we were the better side.
“We’re fortunate we’ve got the technology to analyse these things, and we had 60 per cent of the possession, and we created 20 clear-cut opportunities to get shots off at goal.
“It was an open game and they had a lot of attempts as well but I thought it was unfair on us that we didn’t get anything.
“I suppose it’s one of those when you’ll either get one or two reactions – and I thought our reaction on Saturday was more of a hangover.
“We expended a lot of energy in the derby and if we had won that game, the adrenaline would have pushed us on, but the defeat sucked the wind out of us and, I’ll be honest, it led to the single worst performance I’ve had at Nelson.
“It was dreadful and at times embarrassing. We’ve got a plethora of good footballers, there’s no doubt about that, but we couldn’t put two or three good passes together. We were poor and Cammell Laird thoroughly deserved to win the game.
“But we’ve analysed it, we know where we’ve gone wrong, and if we can put the basics together on Tuesday, we’ll get the response we want. We’ve got an obligation to our supporters to do that.
“Hopefully we can right some wrongs. It’s one we probably can’t afford to lose, because we don’t want to lose ground on the teams above us, and Padiham, well I’m sure they’ll want to kick-start their season.”
The Admirals, who are fourth and three points behind table-topping Colne, will freshen up their side tonight with former Burnley youth team captain and defender Waqas Azam, who has been training with Accrington Stanley, in line to make his debut.
Fell, who will be without the injured Warren Beattie, said: “Waqas is a very accomplished young footballer and he’ll give us a little bit of a different dimension.
“We’ve got full-backs who are great going forward and we’ve got centre-halves who will score goals but when you’ve been leaking goals like we have, you have to make a change.
“He’s solid, strong young lad, who’s got some pace, and I think he’ll be a good addition for us.”
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