David Artell understands that a mentality change is needed at Grimsby Town to end their miserable run of form away from home.
The Mariners are on the road again on Friday night, after the Mansfield Town defeat, as they take on Salford City, who recently announced the sacking of their manager Neil Wood post-losing 5-1 at home to Tranmere Rovers on Boxing Day.
Town have shown their competitiveness this season at home, but have yet to put in a complete performance on their travels to get over the line with a victory. Their winless away run stretches back 14 games, with their win at Doncaster Rovers in April being the last time they tasted victory on the road.
READ MORE: No festive cheer for Grimsby Town in Mansfield Boxing Day clash
Artell does not like what the away run suggests about his team and knows that a mental aspect is affecting the players’ performances.
He said: “There is no point in trying to sugarcoat it. You can’t go half a season without winning away from home. We have to work on their brains as much as anything.
“There is no point brushing things like that under the carpet, we’re going to talk about it for as long as the run goes on. It suggests that we’re a team willing to accept defeat in certain situations, but we won’t, at least not while I’m here.
“I’ve said that to the players, we didn’t deserve to be losing at half-time [against Mansfield] but, we were, so we had to change something in the way we were playing to change the scoreline – the lads didn’t do that.”
There is often not much that separates the best teams in League Two from those lower down, with plenty of factors aside from just the quality of the team going into being successful.
Anyone can beat anyone at this level, and that is why Artell retains confidence that the first away victory is on the horizon, also knowing that the Grimsby fans, who always travel in their numbers, deserve a reward for their loyal support.
He added: “Wherever you go in League Two, it’s a challenge because it’s a competitive league. We’ve got to make sure that we do more of what we did in the first half and less of what we did in the second, it’s as simple as that.
“We can give anyone a game in this league, and we have shown that in the short time I’ve been here, but you can’t just do it for 45 minutes and expect that to be enough, especially when you’re already losing the game.
“The travelling fans have been terrific – we’ve got to give them a trip to remember and it is got to happen soon because you can’t allow your head to affect your performance because we’re losing to ourselves in a sense.”
Original story at https://www.grimsbytelegraph.co.uk/sport/
