Port Vale manager Darren Moore has urged his side to take the lessons learnt from their first win of the season into this weekend’s clash with Mansfield Town.
After returning to League One at the first time of asking, the Valiants had struggled to get a grasp on life back in the third tier. They travelled to Exeter City last weekend on the back of a fourth successive defeat, with the latest against Leyton Orient perhaps the hardest to take.
The took an early lead against the O’s, only to be pegged back five minutes later. Last season’s beaten play-off finalists took the lead just before half time but Devante Cole equalised just after the break. Pushing for the winner, they were hit on the break in the fifth minute of added time as Orient struck late to take the three points.
Moore said in the aftermath that his side are going to need to ‘win ugly’ in order to get that all-important first victory. They did just that a week later with an impressive 2-0 triumph over Exeter City.
Moore Delighted But Aiming To Build On Win
Vale welcome Mansfield Town to Staffordshire this weekend and are hoping to record a second successive maximum haul. Speaking to BBC Radio Stoke, the former Sheffield Wednesday boss said:
“The main thing was to get the clean sheet and stop the rot. We set up for it and knew that if we kept the back door shut we would score.
“I’m chuffed with the clean sheet, I must say.
“Last week after the [Leyton Orient] game, we spoke about the psychology of the game and where it was at.
“For me, waking up Sunday morning, my focus was on the Exeter game and I suppose I get to get rid of the game the week before because I’m working on another one.
“My job is now to work on the Mansfield game and learn from what we did last week and against Exeter.”
Writer’s View
Port Vale will feel that their points tally doesn’t reflect their performances and they have been desperately unlucky in some of their outings this season. However, they say you make your own luck and they took matters into their own hands against Exeter last weekend to finally pick up their first win of the campaign. They are now just outside the bottom four and will take their new-found positivity into Saturday’s clash with Mansfield. It looks to be a winnable game too, with the Stags winless in their last four in all competitions.
