Altrincham FC manager Lee Sinnott gives us the inside track on the Robins’ progress this season in the Vanarama National League. Here’s his latest column for Altrincham Today.
There’s no doubt that we were very fortunate to come away with a 1-0 victory against Boreham Wood on Saturday.
They started very brightly and we had to adjust things tactically quite early on. They will be wondering how the game was still level at half time but in the second half, we gradually forced our way into the game and we had the luxury of a lot of experience and options on the bench.
James Lawrie, Michael Rankine, Luca Havern and Nicky Clee could all have started at a push, but we didn’t want to risk them unnecessarily, particularly as they were all coming back from injuries that might have tightened up at half time, potentially leaving us with having to make substitutions earlier than we would ideally like.
As things turned out three of them came on in the second half, with two of them combining for the only goal of the game, which arrived a quarter of an hour from the end.
Watch highlights from the win over Boreham Wood:
Michael Rankine’s first involvement provided the assist as he caused problems for the opposition defence in the air before pulling the ball back from the byline and after Nicky Clee had seen his initial effort blocked, he has swivelled superbly to finish very well and that’s ended up being the difference between the two teams.
As well as combining for the goal, Michael and Nicky contributed very well during their time on the pitch and that was really good to see, as we have been nursing them back carefully from injury and we can be more confident about them being available for some difficult games that we face between now and the end of the year.
The first of those games is at Forest Green Rovers on Saturday. We lost the first game of the season to Forest Green through a Premier League quality header from Jon Parkin – a great finish. Apart from that there was nothing in it.
I know they’ve had an excellent start and I know they’re riding high in second place, but there’s no reason why we can’t go and ask them questions. We never approach any game differently to another. Well I don’t.
You’d love consistency over four to six games but it never happens because of fatigue, people in form, everything comes into the whole equation. But we’ll look forward to that, to go down to Gloucestershire and deal with that.
Pictures: Michael Ripley
