Assistant manager says the motivation of Wembley final is there for his players as they commence Papa Johns Trophy knockout fixtures on Wednesday evening (kick-off 7:30pm).

• Andy Crosby | “Really looking forward to tough Barnsley test in the Papa Johns Trophy”
• Port Vale’s assistant manager Andy Crosby on the Vale’s Papa Johns Trophy Round of 32 clash with Barnsley at Vale Park
• Crosby on 2022/23 Papa Johns Trophy journey so far: “We have had three really good results with varying quality of performance and different groups of players who have come into the team, whether that has been staying in the team from the previous game or coming back from injury, so there are a variety of things that we can do.”

Port Vale’s assistant manager says the Papa Johns Trophy is a priority that carries motivation as his side prepare for Wednesday night’s Round of 32 clash with Barnsley at Vale Park.

Speaking to the press on Tuesday, the Vale’s assistant manager said the potential of a Wembley final and the fact the game is next on the agenda for Darrell Clarke’s side makes the match both a priority and exciting proposition.

“It is our biggest priority at the moment because it is our next game,” Crosby said. “When you get through the group stages as successfully as we did, with three different calibre of teams, that was the objective done and we moved on knowing that it would guarantee a home game.

“We have had three really good results with varying quality of performance and different groups of players, who have come into the team, whether that has been staying in the team from the previous game or coming back from injury, so there are a variety of things that we can do.

“I think out of all the teams that were left in the competition, it was probably the hardest game we could have got in terms of the draw but we look forward to the game.

“We thought Barnsley were very good when we played them in the league game a couple of months ago, so we are expecting a really tough game, but the carrot at the end of the competition is to go and play at Wembley so that is all the motivation the group needs.”

Reflecting on the weekend’s 1-0 win against Charlton Athletic and how the Vale will prepare for their midweek match with no fixture this weekend, Crosby continued:

“We have changed personnel [before] but those players have come in and know their role. We have slightly tweaked things from 3-5-2 to 3-4-3 at times and fundamentally we are trying to make things as difficult as we can for the opposition when they have the ball and try to be creative with the ball.

“We are trying to develop our style because the higher up the chain you go, the ball becomes much more important and you try to limit the amount of turnovers and the amount of time the opposition spend with the ball in dangerous areas.

“We stressed throughout last week that we had conceded a number of goals in the previous three games and the collective group had to make it much harder for the opposition on Saturday, which we did. We nullified Charlton’s threats and they had the ball and a number of passes in non-dangerous areas of the pitch and we scored a fantastic goal from an area we knew we could transition from and where they would leave space. Well done to the players, well done to MJ [Michael Johnson] and Callum [Brown] for exposing things from their game model and we took advantage and scored a fantastic goal and they didn’t.”