Peterborough United chairman backs his players but wants to see last year’s resilience back

Posh managed to salvage 23 points from matches in which they were in losing positions last season, the most in League One.

This season, however, particularly on the road, Posh have shown frailty and have on five occasions conceded twice in less than four minutes.

On Friday (September 24) Posh conceded three times in eight minutes to lose away at Coventry. These poor periods in away matches are in complete contrast to Posh’s home form, where they have taken all of their seven points and look a competitive Championship side.

MacAnthony has stressed the importance of home form but has backed his players to turn around the away form, provided they dig deeper.

He said: “Our boys know that they can play at this level. You don’t smash Birmingham 3-0 and you don’t take Cardiff and West Brom all the way unless you have some good football players. Even with all of the suspension and injury issues, we’re a good football team and what our players have to wake up and realise is that you can’t go and do what you did against Birmingham and then show up against Coventry, play for 60 minutes and then go under in eight minutes.

“In the Championship, you are going to go behind, you will have to show resilience and last year we were the number one team in the country for coming behind but this year, we are probably the worst team for conceding straightaway after we concede one.

“I’m not questioning our players’ character, but they are going to have to dig deeper. They are going to have to find a way to go away from home and go to places we haven’t been.

“We had a player go off at half-time because he was not feeling well. Well suck it up buttercup, this is what it is; unless you have a broken leg or have a serious issue I’m not interested. You have to go out and help your teammates, we need people playing through the pain barrier. I know these people I’m talking about are good players, but they need to show a bit of resilience and doggedness now to show that they belong.

“Next time we concede a goal, chests need to go out, balls need to be as big as melons and we’ve got to go, ok we need to go and score a goal to get back in the game.

“I have the utmost confidence our players will do that; they’ve been dealt a lot of bad hands with all the injuries and issues but that’s the script that has been written and everybody has to step-up. Unfortunately, we’re just a soft touch away from home at the moment.

“We’ll fix the away form. Home form will help us in this league and the away form will come, we will fix the issues. There’s a lot of hard work ahead.

“Blackpool five weeks ago were one of the worst teams in the Championship and they then went on a nice little run, got some clean sheets and now they’re suddenly 11th; that’s this league. Our players need to realise you can be good at home, but you have to find a way away from home and when they put it together, we’ll be good.

“The players have to look in the mirror now. Some of them struggling for form away from home are good players but look a bit like a rabbit in the headlights, and they need to have a serious word with themselves because they’re better players than that. I think they need to remember how hard we worked to get here. They are not as bad as the results are telling them they are.”