We spoke to Mark Hughes ahead of our clash with Wimbledon this weekend.
Speaking to CUTV, Mark began: "It will be a difficult game for us, fixture-wise. They're a good side, got plenty of energy and physical presence. I know what they're trying to do and they'll ask questions.
“As I've said on numerous occasions, it's more about what we do and can we impose our game plan and what we want to do within the game. Can we do that and not get pegged back by anything that they're trying to achieve in the game. We just need to be on the front foot, ask questions, we're the home side, get some momentum to our play and then see where that takes us.”
Wimbledon played on Tuesday night, and were beaten 2-1 by Cheltenham Town. We asked Mark if he’d had a look at that game, and how we can capitalise on that. He said:
“Yeah, there's areas, all teams at our level are strong in some areas and sometimes they have obvious weaknesses that you can highlight and hope to exploit. We're probably no different in that regard as well.
“It's about just picking the bones out. Obviously we get numerous reports in terms of the games that they've played and the skill is picking the relevant parts and the detail that you can use and understand what's the key areas of our game plan which will give us some success.”
On preparations for the game, Mark explained:
“We've touched on a number of things. Defensively, we've been okay.
“Obviously we conceded late but that can happen in football. Unfortunate with the own goal from Josh but he had to stick the leg out. He wasn't to know whether or not there was somebody coming in from the far post.
“So he had to try and get something on it and it's just unfortunate. That happens in football.
“The timing of it obviously didn't allow us an opportunity to get back on level terms but we'll park that now and look ahead to the games that we have ahead of us.”
The Blues now have a run of three home matches, Mark spoke about the importance of that:
“They’re very important. I think we all recognise that. It's a big chance for us to get points on the board.
“We've played well at home. There’s been great support from everybody and we just need to take that final step to convert the draws into wins and that's going to really help us if we can do it in the three games that we have ahead of us.
“Everybody's aware of where we are. It's difficult but the players themselves are very much on board in terms of what we're doing and what we're trying to achieve and what we have to do.
“It's a simple analogy. We've just got to go out there, give our best and make sure that we win games. It's been difficult this year to do that but I think everybody has seen an improvement in recent weeks in terms of our approach and what we're trying to do.
“We're affecting opposition teams now and we've just got to continue in the same vein along with just adding that extra element to our play which is to score winning goals.”
United hosted an in-house game on Tuesday, Mark talked us through that:
“I will always take the opportunity to do that. I think it's important. We've got quite a big squad so some of the guys needed to be brought up to speed. We've done that.
“It's the second game we've had and it just helps the squad. A number of the players haven’t had any game time or have not played as much. The guys on the bench, they need a little bit more game time in bigger areas so that's why we do it.
“It always helps the group. It keeps everybody on an even keel in terms of the number of minutes.”
Mark mentioned that Georgie Kelly had missed the game, but not through injury:
“He was a little bit poorly on Sunday and Monday so he missed out because we didn't want him within the group.
“But he was back with the group today so he was good to go.”
On Matty Dennis, Mark said:
“We'll have a look at him.
“Obviously, it was disappointing for Matty and for ourselves because he felt something on the morning of the game when we had to make a change. Thankfully it isn't too significant.
“We'll give him as much time as he needs. Hopefully, he'll be an option for us.”
And finally, on Cameron Harper, who came off last weekend, Mark said:
“That was just cramping up. He was fine and he's trained well this week.”
