Striker confident barren spell will end sooner rather than later
Vale hit-man Tom Pope is targeting goals after what he describes as a recent ‘blip’ and the 27-goal striker is confident he will get on the mark sooner rather than later.
On saying that, he is quite happy to draw a blank for the rest of the season, as long as the team manages to clinch from League Two this season.
He says: “As a striker you are going to have some bad spells when you are not putting the ball in the net and it’s been difficult.
“Earlier in the season I was scoring goals, and even if I wasn’t, the team was still putting the ball in the net and that is something in the last few games we have been struggling with.
“We haven’t really created that many chances. Take last Tuesday – earlier on in the season I would have probably had a hat trick, but things aren’t quite falling for me at the moment.
“It’s just little things really. On Saturday at Oxford we hit the bar and I was the only one following it in, their back for were twenty yards away.
“Earlier in the season that would have hit the bar, come back out and I would have had a tap in, but this time it hit the bar and went onto the roof of the net.
the season they go in. I had two good chances in the second half, but at least the chances are coming again. “On Tuesday their ‘keeper made a terrific save, where earlier in
“It was the first time in a few games where I have actually had a couple of decent chances, but I am confident if they keep giving me chances like that I will start putting them away.
“When you have been scoring every other game and going two or three games without a goal and then going on a little run it starts playing on your mind.
“I’m still gambling, I am still getting in there in the positions and I am not doing anything different, I just think that when the balls come in and I have got on the end of them I have headed at the ‘keeper or something.
“The chances that I was getting earlier in the season don’t seem to be dropping for me at the minute, but I am hopeful that it will turn and I will start putting them away again.
“If the team are winning games then I aren’t bothered, and I have said that all along. If I don’t score until the end of the season and we get promoted, I’ll take that now.”