Tom Cleverley has a two-step plan to get over Argyle’s defeat against Peterborough United last weekend.
The Greens ended a sequence of three wins in a row with the loss to – at the time – bottom side Peterborough and will look to hit back with a trip to the new 24th-placed team, Burton Albion, this Saturday.
In between, Cleverley’s squad took on Tottenham Hotspur Under-21s at Home Park in the Vertu Trophy, and convincingly won 6-2 to advance to the next stage of the competition.
Now, the Head Coach wants his side to make the Pirelli Pilgrimage the second step of the redemption from a Posh setback.
“Although we reacted in the cup, it's really the league game where we want to bounce back,” Cleverley told Argyle TV. “I think the boys have taken two or three steps forward at times and whenever we've taken one back, they've gone on to move the machine forward again.
“That’s what it'll be this weekend. Phase one of reacting from a poor defeat last weekend was well executed on Tuesday, and it's all about the next phase of that.
“We really are craving some consistency. When you think of young squads, the first word that would come to mind is inconsistency. It's my job to teach our young players how to be consistent, how to turn average days into draws and not defeats, and things like that.
“I think it's how good you can be as a staff, how receptive your players are to the messages - and a little bit of luck - but I'd say about three months into the season, you'd like to think that we could have some mechanisms that make sure, when maybe we're not at it or as free flowing as we like to be, that we have some mechanisms in place to make sure there's a performance level that we don't drop below.
“I thought that that wasn't quite there on Saturday, so we need to put that right, especially from an attacking perspective.”
Burton won their opening game this season, beating Mansfield Town, but have got just two points from six games since then. Most recently, though, the Brewers went to Huddersfield Town and held them to a 0-0 draw; a game that Cleverley saw, and felt Gary Bowyer’s team acquitted themselves well in.
He said: “I watched a couple of their games recently and I didn't think they showed the best version of themselves, but certainly at Huddersfield, I thought they were excellent.
“I thought they had a really solid performance against Huddersfield last weekend and they had some good chances to win the game themselves.
“They'll be a tough nut to crack. We need to compete in all phases of the game to give ourselves a chance.
“They were intense, really well organised out of possession. Chances are we're going to have to really work hard to make our chances to be creative, to want to beat your man one-v-one, and ultimately to finish. I'm expecting a tough test, the physical side in terms of height will be challenging.
“We have to hit our performance levels. We have to be more consistent, and if we are, we give ourselves a good chance of winning the game.”
