Abbo: An Excellent Display

Hinckley AFC Manager Carl Abbott branded his side’s performance in the 4-0 win over Southam United yesterday as ‘an excellent display’.

AFC were in control throughout courtesy of two goals from Greg Pearson and one each for Marcus Jackson and Marco Adaggio.

And Abbo felt that his side built up the quality of their performance as the game wore on. He said: ‘(It was) an excellent display. We were in control of the game but probably didn’t assert ourselves in the first half as we did in the second half.

‘I think we took the first half to get on top of them and build a scoreline but in the second half I thought we were sublime.

‘I didn’t really expect that second half in terms of the quality, because the pitch had really deteriorated and the message at half time was to work the wide areas and maybe look to beat their full backs, bring our own full backs into play to set crosses up.

‘All of a sudden, we’ve really settled down in the game and we were enthusiastic all day. That’s been the key word across the last two games, blowing the cobwebs away with enthusiasm and tempo. The enthusiasm off the ball, to show and provide angles, was just unbelievable and that’s probably the best performance in the last two or three months.

‘With the Rugby game on Tuesday night, we were rusty and understandably so, and tonight where we’ve built our quality throughout the game to a second half where we looked exceptional.

‘I’ve been saying for a long time that we have players back available now. They’re not 100% fit in many cases, we’ve got some lads that we’re nurturing back to full fitness which is showing with lads coming off early in games.

‘But we have a group that, quality wise, is second to none and I’m really excited about the second half of the season. That performance in the second half was definitely worth the admission fee and we saw some really quality football.’