Trollope dreaming of a simple win

POINTS mean prizes and Bristol Rovers Paul Trollope is eager to shake the tag of “entertainers” if it means a 1-0 result against Walsall tomorrow at the Memorial Stadium.

Trollope has made clear he won’t be sacrificing his attacking intentions in the wake of Rovers’ defensive leaks though. And despite drilling his side on Monday and Tuesday in the art of keeping the back door locked, the remainder of the squad’s build up to tomorrow’s encounter has been spent on creating chances to score goals.

“You need the balance (between attack and defence),” said Trollope. “You need to work on some defending aspects. We did a little bit of DVD analysis and worked hard on the training pitch, especially on Monday and Tuesday.

“We’ll do bits of defending that we need to brush up on, but there’s still an emphasis on passing, on movement, of hopefully creating and scoring goals. We’re delighted to be top scorers in the division and we want to continue that.”

But Trollope would prefer a 1-0 win ahead of a 5-4 result in Rovers favour.

He said: “We’d be delighted with a clean sheet. Obviously, for the neutral and for the fans, 5-4 wins are probably better, but for us, from a professional point of view, we’ll be looking to defend solidly and a clean sheet would be a huge bonus after the goals we’ve conceded.”

Rovers’ last appearance at home was the comprehensive 6-1 overhauling of Hereford, but since then they have been on the road and without a win in three outings.

“There were individuals at fault for certain goals at Peterborough, but they were the same players who defended magnificently at Leeds seven days before so there’s no major witchhunt.

“We had a promotion here a couple of years ago on a lot of clean sheets, a lot of 1-0s, and certainly when Lennie (Lawrence) and I first came together we had a lot of 3-2s and 3-3s and it wasn’t something we liked to be honest.”

There are important players in the treatment room in the form of Danny Coles and Joe Jacobson, but the former is back in training along with Ryan Green, and Jacobson is now just weeks away from a return.

Trollope said: “Coles’ knee is fine but obviously there’s a concern if you do put him in too soon that he’ll injure something else and be out for an even longer period of time. So we’ll assess later in the week.”

Walsall come to the Memorial Stadium chasing their first away win of the season and also, like Rovers looking for a first clean sheet.

Trollope said: “They’ve got some threats in Jabo Ibehre, Ishmel Demontagnac, and Marco Reich. They’ve had a mixed start not dissimilar to ourselves – a couple of good results beating Scunthorpe as well as demolishing Southend so we know they’ve got attacking threats.

"We know we’ll have to be better defensively than last week. But we’ll be going all out to win.