Joey Barton spoke to the press on Thursday afternoon at Poolfoot Farm, ahead of his side’s Lancashire derby clash against Accrington Stanley.
Fleetwood haven’t had a game for two weeks due to the international break, but Barton is aware of what remains for his side with eight Sky Bet League One matches to play.
Town sit eight points off the play-off places with Doncaster picking up all three points against Bristol Rovers on Tuesday night, but Barton has confidence in his side to go and pick up the points, and claim those scouse bragging right on the sideline.
Here are the best quotes from Joey Barton’s press conference…
On the match against John Coleman’s side…
“The pitch will be the same for both sides on Saturday. Accrington Stanley are a very good footballing team and sometimes don’t get the credit they deserve for the football they play.
“John has got his style of play and they have some really good footballers in their squad with some real quality. The pitch probably hurts them more than it is everybody else because they play football. We will be ready for the challenge as I believe good footballers can play on anything.
“It should be an entertaining game at Accrington. It would be great to see many of our fans at the ground, and the key for us is to make that intimidating atmosphere as they did it at Bradford City away. It felt like a shift in a mindset of our players that day.
“This match against Accrington is massive for us, so I want the lads to feel that pressure as they need to get use to it in their career.”
On being back to business…
“It was a nice break really as it gave us a chance to freshen a few of the lads up, and to give us a look at our opponents for this weekend’s match against Accrington after winning our last match against Plymouth.
“The lads are bouncing and are looking forward to getting back to business. At this stage of the season it was nice but we are chomping at the bits and are really enjoying their football at this moment in time.
“As a manager I didn’t like having a few days off, I was in the office looking at ways to do things better so after one day off, I was looking forward to being back in. It gave me more thinking time.”
On the Scousers bragging rights…
“You have to take a lot into consideration before looking at your game plan. We will prepare and see where we can gain an advantage in the game as when we played earlier in the season, they were the better side.
“They will be aware we now have Andy Mangan – former Accrington players – in the building who knows them really well. I expect them to do something different that he doesn’t know and that makes for a great encounter.
“I have known John Coleman and Jimmy Bell for a long period. The game at our place was played in the right manner and now we give ourselves to chance to claim the Scouser bragging rights on Saturday to see who comes out on top.”