Bulut pre-PNE | The next six weeks will be very important
Ahead of Saturday’s return to Sky Bet Championship action, Erol Bulut held a press conference at CCS.
With City looking to begin the latest run of fixtures by bouncing back from a narrow defeat against Norwich City earlier this month, Erol began by reflecting on the performance, as well as his aspirations for the Bluebirds on the league table.
“It was a strange game,” said Erol. “Until the time around the 70th minute everything was going well and under control, so I brought on fresh blood to score a third or even fourth goal. Maybe if we took our chances, it would have been a different result at the end.
“I want to be around this [area] in the league table, so close to the Play-Off positions. I’ve told the players and they know already that we want to be up there, and for this we have to work hard. It’s not enough to play two games and then relax; we cannot relax.”
With the run up to the New Year providing a busy schedule for City, Bulut reiterated the role that the whole squad will need to play over the course of the coming weeks.
“We still have 30 games to play, so many positions will change in the table,” Erol continued. “When you slow down you have to speed up quickly, so this is important. With nine or ten games in 30 days, it’s really hard, which is why I’m saying as before that I need all of the players.
“Tiredness will come, as will injuries and cards, though I hope not. That’s why I need the other guys now, who maybe haven’t played so much until now. They need to show character and performance on the field. These next six weeks will be very important for us.”
Providing an injury update, Erol discussed the return of Perry Ng to match fitness following his absence last time out, then sharing information on Manolis Siopis, Aaron Ramsey and Callum O’Dowda.
“With the international team, he had a small problem, but today he didn’t show any problems when he trained, so it looks like he will be there in the game. All of the players are important for us.
"We don’t want too many injuries, because before we had a few and our game style changed a little bit. We want Aaron Ramsey and Callum O’Dowda to come back as soon as possible. They’ve been running well, but we have to be careful and not start them back too early.”
