Matchday photography by Martyn Nolan
DAVID Fish has told Mossley’s players they can not take the foot off the pedal as they look to go up this season.
Only their best will get the job done and they have found out in no uncertain terms where they were lacking.
The Lilywhites’ 3-2 Boxing Day win at Glossop North End leaves them fifth in the West Division, occupying the last play-off place.
They are ahead of where they were at this stage last season and manager Fish believes they have set themselves up for a fine end to the campaign.
But it will only come if everyone produces their best every week, starting with the home tie against Ramsbottom on January 2.
They have already seen what happens if they do not as they lost 3-1 at the second-bottom side in August.
Fish told the club: “I criticised the players a little bit behind closed doors about results we were getting against sides in the bottom six – 10 points against sides on the bottom six before Glossop.
“We’ve got to be at least as good against Ramsbottom as we were at Glossop. We could’ve defended better but moving the ball going forward, we were good.
“If we can do that against Ramsbottom we should win but we turned up, under-performed and got turned over at their place.
“We can’t be dropping standards. We can’t take teams for granted, we’ve got to be relentless and play at that same level, that same intensity, with that same quality week in, week out.”
Mossley held on for half an hour after letting a lead slip twice at Glossop and Fish admitted the result was vital.
He added: “We needed a win, we needed to get a bit of momentum going into the second half of the season.”