Forest Green Rovers travel to the southwest coast this Saturday to face second place Plymouth Argyle, as manager Duncan Ferguson seeks his first win on his ninth attempt.
The Scotsman is well aware of the uphill task his side face at Home Park tomorrow afternoon.
“They’ve got a tremendous home record with only one loss,” he said.
“They’ve scored a lot of goals, they’re a top team and that’s where they are in the league.”
Argyle currently have the joint best home record in England’s top four divisions, with 16 wins and draw from 18 games.
But with 10 games to go the Pilgrims have seen their margin over third-place Ipswich Town cut to two points after a 3-0 loss away at Barnsley last weekend.
Ferguson believes his side can get a positive result if they’re industrious in their work.
“We’ve got to be very accurate for 90 minutes, and be concentrated, hopefully, take a few chances on the counter attack. We’ll probably have to suck it up quite a bit and hit them on the counter, hopefully, it’ll pay off.
“It’s going to be a tough afternoon but we’ll be committed, we’ll try our very best and hopefully come away with something.”
Hear from Dunc who shared his thoughts with the local media ahead of tomorrow’s away trip to @Argyle📽️#WeAreFGR💚
— Forest Green Rovers (@FGRFC_Official) March 17, 2023
Rovers on Monday announced that head of recruitment Stevie Greave had left the club after only five months in the role, with travel commitments being understood as the reason for the departure.
Ferguson says he isn’t aware of any immediate replacements: “I’m talking to the board about certain things, and we need something in place pretty soon because we need players in or we need to be moving forward as quickly as we can.
“The quicker the club appoints someone the better, how soon that’ll be I have no idea.”
The Rovers manager suggests that whoever steps into the role needs to be in close discussion with him when it comes to bringing in new players.
“He’s certainly got to be in that conversation, I’ve got a certain type of player and playing style so that’s got to marry up.
If everyone is on the same page then it’s no problem. That’ll be the sensible way to go about it and I think that’s how it works in all clubs rather than recruiting someone who he has never seen or is not keen on.”
Argyle manager Steven Schumacher played with Ferguson during his second spell at Everton, with the two later being involved in the Toffees coaching roles.
The former Everton striker claims he looks forward to meeting the 38-year-old again, saying “he was at Everton as a coach, he was coaching younger ones, maybe U10s I’m not quite sure.
“If he’s a big blue, then brilliant, every time I’ve met him he’s been a good guy, and his assistant (Mark Hughes) as well. It’ll be nice to catch up.”
Ferguson will be hoping a positive result at home park can help them gather momentum ahead of facing top of the league Sheffield Wednesday.