Pope says Vale have to learn how to hold on to a lead

Striker Tom Pope spoke about Vale’s inability to defend as a team following the defeat at Meadow Lane at the weekend and he says Vale need to toughen up.

Too many times this season Vale have not been able to hold on to lead, despite playing well, and Pope says they need t earn from experience.

“We created some good chances against Notts County in the last fifteen to twenty minutes, but we are not going to keep getting away with it. We are scoring goals and we are letting ourselves down at the other end.

“It is not just the defensive lads, but the whole team. For the first goals the winger has done Jenno, he has got in between and nobody is marking him.

“It is not just one or two mistakes, we are making far too many and you are going to get punished and they certainly finished the majority of their chances.

“I said last season when we were winning away from home I thought it suited us because the incentive was on the home team to come at us. We had pace and lads that could get forward and we counter-attacked and did well.

“On Saturday we started well, we got the ball forward and had players running off and got ourselves two-nil up and then we go back to making the errors.

“It is just a mental thing I think. We can’t keep defending like that. We were two-nil up, looking solid, we got a couple of goals, we were looking a threat, we were winning our battles and then they go and score within a couple of minutes of us getting the second goal and it just kills you.

“At this level, when you get your second goal you have got to start giving it five or ten minutes to calm the game down and let yourselves settle in again.”