Yeovil Town manager Mark Cooper has said his side will be looking to break their goal-scoring drought as they take on Sutton United tonight.
The Glovers have gone three games without a goal and the boss had made four changes from last weekend’s 1-0 defeat at Oldham Athletic for the fixture. On loan Rotherham United striker Ciaran McGuckin and Jordan Young start in wide positions with Brett McGavin, who has three goals this season, in the middle of the pitch.
Full-back Michael Smith misses out with a hamstring injury which saw him limp off early in the second half on Saturday and is replaced by Dom Bernard, but Cooper said his side would still start with a familiar formation.
He told BBC Somerset’s Ian Randall: “We are always a 4-3-3 or a 4-3-2-1. Brett McGavin has a real goal threat and he’s in the team. We have to look at the strengths more the weaknesses. Dom Bernard comes in (for Smith) and he is a good replacement and Ciaran McGuckin and Jordan Young come in as one of the wide forwards and we want to come here and attack tonight and try and score some goals.
“We have looked organised and competent, people say we have not scored but we scored seven games in two games (against Boston United and AFC Fylde) and then we have gone on a run of not scoring. So it about trying to get that consistency and solidity as well as having a real goal threat.
“It is something we have to address, we have to make sure we do not unbalance things too much and become wide open, but still have that goal threat going forward. That is what we are trying to do tonight, we have people on the pitch that can attack the goal, so we will see what happens.”
The manager admitted he had learned the lesson of his side’s flat performance in the 1-0 midweek home defeat to Solihull Moors a fortnight ago which followed a dramatic 4-3 win at AFC Fylde 72 hours earlier.
He added: “I learnt that we had an unbelievable win at Fylde with all the emotion and euphoria of that win, but then we played the following Tuesday (in the 1-0 home defeat to Solihull Moors) and we had no energy. That is down to me and I should have made some changes. We had a get together and spoke about freshening things up and put four fresh ones in with Saturday in mind.“