Swindon Town

MARTIN Ling spoke to the media after Town's 2-1 win over Rochdale.

On the three points...
It wasn’t pretty. I just said to the players: I just feel where we're better now off the ball but on the ball today we were poor again. It's not always easy against ten men - it lifts the other team sometimes and they do a bit more. It's four wins out of five and still room for improvement. It's important to stay in games and battle it out and I thought we did that today.

On the performance...
We like to pass the ball and I know the crowd get frustrated. When we did get out we looked dangerous but just decision-making in the top third as well. Maybe we invited pressure onto us. Maybe it's still a confidence thing here. It's not massively slick at the moment but 12 from 15 - I would have snapped your hand off if you'd offered it me at the start.

On goals scored...
The first goal was an excellent goal. It was the first time we had any type of movement and moved them (Rochdale) from side to side. The second goal was a bit lucky with a big deflection but if you don’t shoot you don’t score. We're frustrated. If you looked at training there's more to come from us it's just not clicking. It's like a stuttering car at the moment and when we click into gear we look really sharp but it's just not clicking into gear at the moment.
 
On defending...
We talked about both sides of the game - defensively getting exposed but we all attack together and defend together. Defending and working hard is definitely better than on the ball at this moment in time but being down the bottom where we were it's like coming out of a coma. We’ve been stagnant and we're coming out of it slowly but we are coming out of it which is important.
 
On Nathan Thompson's injury...
(The scan shows us that Nathan is) Where we expected. It's healing nicely and it's probably another two weeks before he's back in full-time traiing. Then it's about getting training time and then match time into his legs.