Neil Harris calls for more of the same from promotion hopefuls Cambridge
Neil Harris insisted Cambridge will stick to their usual routine ahead of next Saturday’s promotion decider.
A comprehensive 3-0 win over Barrow leaves the U’s a point ahead of Salford and a further point above Notts County with one game of the League Two season to play. It means that if Harris’s side win at Crewe next Saturday, they will secure an immediate return to League One.
Barrow slipped to the bottom of the EFL due to results elsewhere and must win against Newport or they will be relegated. Even victory in that game might not be enough, with a three-point gap to Harrogate and Crawley and all of the relegation candidates having a better goal difference.
“All we’ve said to the players there is that you don’t get many opportunities like this in your career,” Harris said.
“You don’t get many opportunities to go into the last game of the season in a position like we are. So you have to enjoy it, but you don’t step backwards. You have to embrace it and move forward.
“Nothing changes. We’ve been set in our routine over the course of the season.
“We’ve experienced this enough over the last four or five weeks that we get ourselves into a strong position then we mentally have to handle ourselves in the correct manner. The players have done it really well, we’ve shown the ability to bounce back.
“Today was sort of your warm-up for next week in a sense that today there was pressure on the game. We’d gone behind Salford and had to respond accordingly. I felt we had to win the game today.
“So there was pressure on the situation, but you wouldn’t have known it.”
Sam Foley knew his side had not performed well enough to give Barrow a chance of pulling off a surprise result.
“It’s bitterly disappointing,” he said. “To come here with expectations of what we wanted and for it not to come, it’s tough to take. At the end of the day, we’ve only got ourselves to blame.
“I totally understand the fans’ frustration. They’ve waited a long time for the football club to be back in the Football League. It’s not looking great at the minute for the football club.
“All I can say is I apologise on behalf of the players and the staff. We’ve tried our best since I’ve come in to try and change things. The damage was probably already done but we believed we could rectify it. We gave ourselves a fighting chance.
“To turn up how we turned up today, in such a pivotal game, is so disappointing and it’s probably the reason the players are where they are and down at the bottom of the league.”