Sam Ricketts: Shrewsbury Town mistakes are inexcusable

Town were beaten 2-1 by Rochdale on Saturday, making it back-to-back Montgomery Waters Meadow defeats inside a week.

Like last Tuesday’s 1-0 defeat to Bristol Rovers, boss Ricketts felt his side dominated the contest but were made to pay for failings in both penalty boxes.

Ricketts, whose team have won just one of their first seven league games and taken one point from four home contests, watched Shrewsbury fall 2-0 down to the Dale inside 36 minutes through poor defending.

The Town chief said: “The two goals were inexcusable. You should be winning the first contact at this level and that’s it. That cost us the game.

“Yes, they are individual errors, it was one long ball and cost us two goals.

“Yes (we need better from them). You can’t make individual errors like that, It cost us the game.

“They play out from the back well and cut teams open but we restricted that and two long balls can’t result in two goals, especially with the dominance we have in the air.

“That ball should be going back towards their goal and not ours.”

Ricketts says he shares the frustration of Town supporters. He added: “There is no real home advantage or disadvantage. Maybe if our supporters were in and really pushing the lads second half maybe it makes a difference.

“No-one’s more frustrated than the players and myself. I think the vast majority of fans who understand the game can see what we’re doing. We’re not doing a lot wrong.

“A few tweaks here and there and they should turn to three points.”

Harry Burgoyne was back between the sticks for Town with Arsenal loan goalkeeper Deyan Iliev sidelined through injury, although he made the bench in case of emergency.

Ricketts said he was hopeful Iliev’s absence would not be a lengthy one ahead of a trip to Fleetwood tomorrow evening.

Ethan Ebanks-Landell was only well enough for the bench against Rochdale after complaining of illness but testing negative for Covid.

The Town boss confirmed it was still unclear the extent of damage left-back Scott Golbourne has done to his ribs but the injury is likely to see him sidelined for a number of weeks, with Charlie Daniels impressing on his Shrewsbury debut 24 hours after penning a short-term deal.

Daniels, 34, the experienced former Premier League full-back who signed as a free agent on Friday having left Bournemouth, caught the eye with some wicked deliveries.

Ricketts said of Daniels: “He’s someone we’ve been working on for a while now and is another great addition to the squad.

“I’m delighted to have him here. He’s obviously got very good ability on set-pieces and from open play with the amount of crosses he put in.”