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Crawley Town beat Dagenham and Redbridge 5-1 in their fourth pre-season friendly of the season. Here is Scott Lindsey's full post-match interview
Transcript
00:00Scott, thanks for joining us. Four pre-season games, 16 pre-season goals and have a good
00:08show into that. What did you make of it?
00:09Pleased with that again. We got out of it what we wanted. Obviously we stepped up in
00:15terms of opposition. It was a tough challenge. We got out of it what we wanted. We wanted
00:23to cover a certain amount of distance and we've done that. Players who come on are topping
00:31up their runs now as we speak so they'll get the similar distance to what the boys who started.
00:36So another box tick there and like you say we scored five good goals and really pleased
00:41with that and showing good signs at the moment.
00:44It looked really snappy out there really quick. Is that something you've been really impressed
00:48with so far?
00:49I thought our tempo was really electric tonight. I thought we were really quick and even the
00:54second goal you could see Gav picks the ball up, the ball goes out of play, Gav picks it
00:58and throws it. They switch off for that moment. We're still switched on and it's stuff like
01:02that that I want to kind of encourage this year to play at a tempo that oppositions can't
01:06cope with us. I was pleased with the tempo in which we played at today. I thought we controlled
01:12it and I was really pleased with some of the play was really good today and some individual
01:20performances as well so I'm really pleased.
01:21Yeah we speak about it a lot about how the players on the bench who don't start the game
01:25need to come on and pick it up straight away. They've certainly done that. We make seven
01:28changes on 60 minutes and before you know it we're 5-1 up so that must be really pleasing
01:31as well.
01:32We kind of knew what we wanted to do on 65 minutes actually when we made the changes
01:37but we also made two changes on 20 minutes. We knew that Jay and Louis Watson could only
01:46play 20 minutes tonight rather than them wait for their 20 minutes. We thought it might be
01:51beneficial to warm them up, start the game and then bring them off after 20. So we kind
01:56of planned that tonight and planned the changes on 65 minutes and then you saw the two younger
02:02boys come on with about 20 minutes to go as well. One of which got two goals. I've got
02:11to say he's been amazing. He's 16 years of age and he's played in a couple of the games
02:17now and he's looked great. So yeah, really pleased with everybody tonight. I thought everyone
02:22who came on impacted the game well and the boys who started did really well as well.
02:27Yeah a lot of players have grown in confidence as well. The likes of Harry McCurdy probably
02:31is best performance in a Crawley shirt so far. So again it must be really pleasing for you
02:35to see these players just growing confident and getting quite comfortable with the style.
02:39Yeah I think so. I think that we've done a lot of work on the style. Nearly every day
02:44we do 11 v 11s. I coach the team in detail about certain runs we make, about certain passing
02:49lines, about certain movements and the players are getting to grips with it really well. I think
02:55Harry McCurdy is somebody who can play a number of positions really well. You've seen him play
03:00wide right, you've seen him play kind of a little bit more inside the pitch tonight and I think
03:06Ivory is very much a threat to the opposition. And like I say I'm pleased with lots of what
03:15I've seen up to now in the games that we've played.
03:17Yeah and as we touched on right at the start we've scored a lot of goals and we're not
03:20short of options up front are we? I mean Louis Flower come on and get three goal
03:23involvements right at the end as well so it could be some tough choices to take at the
03:26start of the season up front I guess.
03:27Yeah but that's what we want. You know we want that. I think we all know Kaby Tishmanga
03:32is a very good striker and a good player but Louis Flower is now pushing him you know.
03:37Louis has been brilliant and again tonight he didn't score tonight for the first time but
03:42like you say he had three goal involvements and I thought he was really bright when he'd come on.
03:47It's only good for a manager to have good options.
03:50Yeah and ramped up the sort of physicality tonight as well obviously playing against a
03:53full-time team for only the second time in pre-season and we dealt with that test well as well didn't we?
03:57Yeah for sure it was always going to be a step up in standards against us in terms of opposition
04:03obviously from last week with the two games with East Grinstead and three bridges
04:10but I kind of wanted that I wanted that step up tonight and we're going to have to step up again
04:16on Saturday against a championship team so another level now so but it's good because we're we're now
04:23looking closer to the league starting so we've got to have these challenges and I thought we took on
04:29the challenge really well tonight and and now we look forward to Saturday.
04:33Brilliant. In terms of performance and squad and fitness are you where you want to be at this point
04:39in the pre-season? Yeah definitely I think you can see that we're really fit sharp like I say I think
04:45the ball goes out of play you see my players running to get it and throw it in they want they want the
04:49ball in play quickly because I think they have the confidence that they can run over teams
04:55so yeah I think in terms of fitness wise I think we're we are where we want to be definitely
05:02I can't say I want I can't say that we're in front of where we want to be no you can never say that
05:08you know I'm I'm really happy with where we are from a tactical point of view and and and the stuff
05:16that you've seen tonight and the goals that we've scored I'm happy too so from a football point of
05:21view and a fitness point of view I think we're in a good place yeah and you talked briefly about Harry
05:25McCurdy then there was sort of flashes of brilliance and he's he's going to be a player that's going to
05:29excite the fans but that's what he is he's flashes of brilliance you know he he might not be in the
05:33game for 10 minutes then all of a sudden out of nowhere he'll he'll be unbelievable for five
05:39minutes you know what I mean and that's what he is and he will create he will score out of nothing
05:46and he's like I say when we signed him he's a character yeah do you know what I mean
05:52opposition fans will hate him our fans will love him I'll sometimes hate him
05:59but he's a character and he's uh you know listen I love I love Harry and he's he brings so much to
06:04the team not just out on the pitch but in that dressing room as well you can imagine what he's
06:07like and um he's great for us and I was really pleased with his performance and I thought he's
06:13very good tonight yeah and like you say we only saw Jay Williams for 20 minutes but it was great to see
06:17him back on the pitch wasn't it doing what he does yeah he played he played that 20 minutes like
06:21he was playing in the world cup final yeah he's just like an incredible professional and drive and
06:26determination to win a game and do everything right is just inspiring you know it's inspiring
06:31to watch and I'm proud of Jay because um he's come from you know a non-league position a couple of years
06:41ago and really stamped his authority down as a league player now and you can see the quality he brings and
06:46his attitude and want willing determination to drive the team forward is incredible I love
06:52I love his attitude towards winning and playing well you know he's he's in there now watching
06:58the the goal that they scored he wants to watch it back to make sure it was was there any more we
07:02could have done and could we have supported Harvey on the on the action better and he didn't he wasn't
07:07even on the pitch at that moment but he's in there watching it on the on the footage he he's just
07:12desperate to do so well for the team um and he's brilliant for us so yeah it was great to see him out
07:17yeah and we didn't see Danny Cashman involved tonight is that just managing minutes yeah no
07:21uh Danny's Danny's kind of like worked so hard in the in the last weeks and obviously played lots of
07:28minutes in the games and he did feel a little bit of a five issue on on Saturday in the in the first
07:37half so we he was actually planning on staying on the pitch a little bit longer we ended up bringing
07:41him off at half time we don't want to risk him because obviously he's going to be a very big player for
07:45us this season don't want to lose him at the start so we have to be um cautious with that
07:51um that's the reason why he wasn't involved tonight but we're hopeful that we'll see him Saturday yeah
07:55and on Saturday what sort of Portsmouth side are you expecting and how excited are you about seeing
08:00the fans at the Broadfield stadium again well first of all spoke to John uh Portsmouth manager and
08:05I think they're going to come full strength um so that's going to be good and a big test for us
08:12um and seeing the fans nothing better nothing better in this job than seeing the fans I just
08:19can't wait to come out and and see him again you know it's been a while since we played at
08:23at the Broadfield and yeah I'm looking forward to that on Saturday brilliant good luck thank you

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