Yeovil Town manager Chris Hargreaves has said he isn’t feeling the pressure after the Glovers recorded a sixth draw from their opening ten games of the National League season.
Following what the boss described the 1-1 draw at home to Boreham Wood as a “dominant” performance, he expressed his frustration that his side wasn’t making it count in the “areas that mattered“.
Speaking to BBC Somerset’s Sheridan Robins, he said: “It was (a dominant performance) but it doesn’t get us the three points, which is hard to take, I’ve got to admit. It’s a case of being very, very good with the ball, but in that final third not being ruthless enough.
“(The players are) absolutely giving me everything and it was a dominant, confident performance, but where it matters, is that 18-yard box and there’s enough chances in the second half to score five.”
Hargreaves promised it would be another hard week training in the lead up to next weekend’s trip to Southend United.
For the seventh time this season, Yeovil took the lead through a 39th minute goal from Alex Fisher, his first since returning to the club in the summer, but – as happened in five out of the previous six occasions- they were unable to hold the lead.
The equaliser from visiting midfielder Jack Payne on the stroke of half-time took them in level at the break.
The manager said afterwards: “(It’s) just bad decision making, thats all it is, there’s no trait or pattern that we see that we don’t talk about, we talk about it a lot. It’s just a case of staying on your feet, the basics of football, keeping your units tight and seeing danger when someone is running toward your goal.
“That’s a real dissapointment again, but what they didn’t do against a very good side who have done well over the years is wilt, they went at it and went for the throat second half.”
There was plenty of praise for both the Boreham Wood goalkeeper Nathan Ashmore who (again) played well against Yeovil, and Fisher who scored his second, first goal in the green and white of Yeovil Town.
Hargreaves said: “You come back here and you want to prove yourself again, there has to be some real anger, if you haven’t got the anger, you won’t be able to do it. (Alex) showed that in his goal, that he followed up and wanted to put himself in those areas, he had a couple of chances second half that I’d expect him to score… but great for him to get his first goal.”
Finally, with six draws from ten, there was the promise of effort and that the side was giving everthing, but, ahead of two tough away games in a row, Hargreaves was asked if he felt the pressure to get some results, the answer was rapid and emphatic.
“No.”
“No, I don’t feel pressure, I put pressure on myself anyway and so do the players. That’s why I’ve been in football for 35 years because I put pressure on myself, if the lads feel pressure, good, that’s good, they should want to get in the team and stay in the team.”
For what it’s worth, Boreham Wood manager Luke Garrard was gushing with praise for the Glovers’ side, he told his media team post match.
He said: “I think Yeovil will be gutted, I have to say they were deserved of all three points, they had chances to win three games, let alone one, I thought they were excellent this afternoon… they stifled us, we were fortunate to take a point this afternoon.
“We were below par… Yeovil didn’t allow us to get our game going, I thought Gime Toure was fantastic today, I thought (Sam) Pearson‘s runs in behind were fantastic, I have to give full credit to Chris and his team as, like I say, they were very deserved of three points.”
Thanks for the kind words, Luke, but leave that ‘keeper at home, next time, yeah?