Rest key to recovery says Shrewsbury's Adam Reach

The 20-year-old Middlesbrough loanee admitted a testing sequence of three games in eight days has taken its toll on Town's small squad. And a seven-day break from competitive action, following trips to Crawley and Bristol City prior to the clash with Kenny Jackett's side, would help them recover ahead of this weekend's trip to Bradford City.

He said: "I think the lads need some time off (from playing competitive football). We've had the weekend to recover and a full week of training ahead.

"The majority of the lads have played three games in a week.

"At any level that is a hard thing to do, especially with such a small squad as well. The fact that the next game is on Saturday will help us a lot."

Despite the disappointment of Saturday's 1-0 loss to Wolves, due to Bakary Sako's controversial 84th- minute penalty, Reach said the team should take great encouragement from their performance.

And he is convinced that if they can maintain the standards set against Kenny Jackett's promotion favourites, they will win far more games than they lose this season.

"The gaffer said on a different day it could have been another win," he said.

"From the start of the season we have put in a lot of good performances which unfortunately we have drawn when we should have or could have really won.

"We could be sitting second or even top if we had, but throughout the season games like this will more likely go our way."

Meanwhile Shrewsbury's youth team came through a nail-biting Midland Youth Cup tie against Port Vale last night.

Town went through 3-1 on penalties after the match had finished 1-1 after extra-time at Vale Park.

Kaiman Anderson scored Shrewsbury's goal in the first half of extra time but they were pegged back.

Sam Molyneux, Anderson and Josh Ginnelly scored the decisive penalties while goalkeeper Shaun Rowley made two saves.