Walsall vs Crewe preview: Darrell Clarke defends changes to Saddlers team

Fans have questioned Clarke’s team selections in recent weeks after consecutive losses to strugglers Carlisle and Morecambe, which came off the back of a successful period where the club won four in six league games.

Ahead of the visit of Crewe tomorrow, Clarke has defended making changes to his team – while admitting he doesn’t always get it right.

“We all want that consistency in results,” he said.

“In November and December we changed it at least once or twice, so what was the difference?

“Everyone’s an expert and when you lose a couple of football games, you’re always going to get analysed as a manager.

“It’s black and white and I have no problem with it, it’s fine.

“You’re a rubbish manager when you’re losing games and a good manager when you’re winning games.

“If you’re winning games and make changes, nothing is said about those changes.

“If you’re losing games and make changes, everyone says something about those changes.

“That’s the beautiful world of football that we live in so we crack on from that.

“I make no bones about it, I pick the team and work the team.

“Fair enough, do I always get my decisions right? No, unfortunately I don’t.

“But if you look through my career I’ve got more decisions right than I haven’t.

“The facts are that we’ve lost a couple of games and played poorly, but still, for me, have been the better team and created the better chances.

“In the bigger picture at this football club is that I think we’re moving in the right direction.”

The 2-0 defeat to Morecambe on Tuesday was the result of a below-par Saddlers performance, which left many fans frustrated.

With third-placed Crewe in town tomorrow, Clarke says his job now is to pick his players up ahead of the match.

“First of all your dealing with mindsets of players, because they’ll be feeling pretty low after the stick we got as a group, which is understandable,” he added.

“The first thing is picking your squad of players up because I have a squad that cares and are hard working.

“You get in the process of doing that by rebooting at the training ground and picking a team ready to go out there fighting.

“When you start at 3pm the score is 0-0 and I’m sure the fans will get right behind us if we can start the game on the front foot.

“It’s good we’ve got a game whether it’s home or away, you get the opportunity to put it right.

“As a manager, and a manager that cares, you take it personally and feel like you’ve let people down when you get a result like that.

“You spend the day rebooting and analysing and then you pick yourself up and you’re ready to go again.

“That’s the football world, the way it is.

“It’s very disappointing in those games that we haven’t picked up the results that we possibly should have done.

“With that there’s animosity, fan frustration - I understand that totally.

“We’ve shot ourselves in the foot the last couple of games, but you can’t change the past.

“It’s about working towards the future and another game on Saturday.”