Shropshire Star

Jeepers keepers for Shrewsbury on Monday

It must have seemed like a video nasty on this occasion.

Published

But the Shrewsbury Town goalkeepers' union do what they do every Monday – go through footage of the previous game.

This time, there was plenty to look at for keepers Mark Halstead and Jayson Leutwiler and goalkeeping coach Danny Coyne after the 5-1 defeat to Wigan.

But even if they keep clean sheets, the process of analysis and improvement never stops.

Halstead: "We review the games on a Monday morning and go through it in detail with 'Coyney.'

"If I've seen something that needed doing differently or he (Leutwiler) has done well, I'm more than willing to point it out and he'd be the same.

"I'm happy to have that because there are people who when they're not playing, they're not the best trainers to be around."

Halstead was powerless to stop Wigan's five goals on Saturday but if he made a mistake, he would be the first to admit it.

He said: "I'm a perfectionist, but I'm also my biggest critic. I'm just happy to be playing – long may it continue – and as long as I'm playing well, I'm sure the manager will keep faith in me.

"Last year was very frustrating but I couldn't complain because Jayson was playing so well. This season, he's had a couple of injuries so I've had my chance and I feel I've taken it."

Competition, they say, keeps people on their toes and there's no shortage of that in the Town goalkeeping department.

Halstead has made 17 appearances this season and has kept fit-again Leutwiler on the bench for the last two games.

The 25-year-old insists Leutwiler knows he has serious competition for his place, but maintains any rivalry is healthy.

The former Blackpool man said: "I think he's been thinking that for a long time. We push each other every day and we work well together.

"Whoever is playing, the other one supports him no matter what happens. I don't see it as a rivalry because we're friends – we get on very well."

The man behind both is coach Coyne. Now 42, the 16-capped former Wales international saw it all in well over 400 games over two decades between the sticks with Tranmere, Grimsby, Leicester, Burnley and Middlesbrough.

Halstead continued: "I've said it many times before, but he's the best one I've had. Not just in terms of the training we do but the stuff we do away from training, such as when you're not playing.

"He's been in situations like that before, so he knows how to deal with it. I don't always deal with it the best, but he's always a calming influence and tells me what I should and shouldn't be doing.

"I've come on a lot here and that's down to him, but it's been having chance to show it."