'It's time to deliver', says Chesterfield boss Paul Cook as League Two season hits crunch period
“It is time to deliver.”
That was one of the big takeaways from Paul Cook’s pre-match conference ahead of Chesterfield’s home game against bottom club Harrogate Town on Saturday. The Spireites are ninth in League Two, one point off the play-offs and nine behind the automatics, with 16 matches remaining.
With promotion the aim, Town have given themselves some work to do but they produced an excellent performance in their 3-2 win at Bristol Rovers last weekend. They were on the front-foot from minute one, were aggressive and were a huge attacking threat. If they can replicate that and cut out the concessions then they will not be far away from their goal.
In the game before, when they led 2-0 against Walsall, they were brilliant for 40 minutes before they took their foot off the gas and only ended up coming away with a point. Cook described that situation as ‘putting a pin in a balloon’ but the same could not be said of their showing down in Bristol.
He told the DT: “I said about us putting a pin in the balloon, the players blew the balloon up last week, and the balloon is still floating going into the match tomorrow. Last week was a really good step to where we want to be.”
That victory at the Memorial Ground was Chesterfield putting a marker down as they created several good chances, could have won by more and showed great spirit to get back in front after trailing 2-1.
“We have put a benchmark down now, I have told the players how we want to finish the season,” Cook said. “Our supporters know how we want to finish the season. And we want to keep winning. No one is hiding from that so when the disappointments come, like they will come, we have got to manage that. The final league table is the one that tells no lies, it’s not the one with 16 games to go with the greatest respect.”
League Two had largely been an inconsistent division up until the start of this year but a number of teams at the top have been able to string a run of wins together and Cook says Chesterfield have got to put their foot to the floor now.
He added: “We have been through the learning curves, we have been through the ‘need time’ bits, it is time to deliver, that’s for sure and hopefully we can do that.”