Shrewsbury must get out of blocks vs Sunderland
David Longwell has called on Shrewsbury Town to not get caught on their heels again Sunderland against tonight.
Town were undone by a sluggish opening half hour at the Stadium of Light just three Saturdays ago, where Sunderland top scorer Charlie Wyke’s early header was the difference between the sides.
Longwell, who is in charge with Aaron Wilbraham in the absence of Steve Cotterill, feels Shrews created enough to merit at least a point in the North East last month.
“When we played them we had opportunities in the game, a good few we should’ve scored from,” Longwell said.
“With the players we’ve got and the way things are going forward we will definitely create opportunities.
“Every game we’ve had the players have created chances, even the losses.”
Longwell praised Shrewsbury players’ mentality for the way they have performed since Cotterill’s appointment, either side of the Covid-19 outbreak that meant three weeks without a fixture.
“The players here have the same mindset, they want to win games. Against Swindon the way took to the game, they’ve got a really good mentality,” he added.
“I find the players right at it week-by-week, day-by-day, game-by-game.
“Sunderland started the game better than us, credit to them. We’ve got to make sure we start better than them tonight.
“It’s not the players weren’t up for it, of course they were, just they were a bit better than us.
“But we are getting the freshness into us and we’ll definitely go out to start the game better than we did last time and hopefully we can continue the run we’ve started again and get a result.”
Aaron Pierre (calf), Matthew Pennington (shoulder) and Brad Walker (ankle) remain sidelined through injury.
Town have appointed Longwell’s former Orlando and St Mirren colleague Max Rogers as interim academy boss.
