By James Burgoyne
Weymouth Manager Brian Stock believes “concentration is key” as he looks to continue to raise the standards of his side, following last night’s 1-1 draw at Dagenham & Redbridge.
The Terras returned to Dorset with a valuable National League point; Liam Gordon’s 43rd-minute strike had initially given the East London side the lead, but it was cancelled out by an acrobatic injury-time effort from Jake McCarthy.
Dagenham & Redbridge had an opportunity to regain the lead with seconds to spare but were denied by a superb save from Ethan Ross.
When asked if Ross’ save was as good as a goal Stock said: “Most definitely. Although I’ve given the players a lot of praise at full time, I need to make sure that they remember one or two things that we need to work on.
“Concentration is key, we could have quite easily lost in the last dying seconds of the game, which would have been an absolute sucker punch.
“When we do go in the lead or we equalise, we need to make sure that we’re organised and we concentrate so that we don’t concede straight after we scored and to be fair to the boys we’ve done that quite well in recent weeks, but we got let off the hook tonight.”
Stock wants to improve the game management within his squad, following a below-par first-half performance he was happy with how his side responded following the break at the Chigwell Construction Stadium.
He continued: “I still think we were below our standards, when I look at the first half against Wrexham, we tried to emulate that. We weren’t winning second balls.
“(For Dagenham’s goal) I felt that although it was a great piece of individual skill, we can’t allow players to come through the heart of our team and put it into the top corner.
“That’s something that we need to get better at in terms of game management. We need to make sure that we’re a lot stronger and more physical, and if we have to take a foul, then that’s the sort of sacrifice that we might have to do in those situations.
“The most pleasing thing for me is getting in at half-time, and addressing one or two, formation changes, a couple of tactical changes. I felt that being able to play out from the back and wanting the ball was a big, big difference (in the second-half).”
