Carlisle United manager on approach to set-piece defending

The Blues manager has seen his side concede a number of goals in recent weeks from dead-ball situations.

Simpson said after last weekend’s defeat at Leyton Orient – when the Os took the lead through an unmarked Shaq Forde from a corner – that he would be taking another look at how United set-up for set-pieces.

But, ahead of the home clash with League One leaders Portsmouth, he said this would not mean a major overhaul.

“We've talked about it,” said Simpson.

“It isn't a fresh look – we're not going back to the drawing board.

“There are just small areas.

“Funnily enough, we looked into it last week before the Orient game where [we found that] the average over the season for League One for conceding goals from set plays is seven, and we had conceded seven before the weekend.

“Now, unfortunately, there's been two or three of them that have been what we'd call second phase – so it's not the first contact but it's the next phase of it that we've conceded goals.

Paul Simpson says 'minor adjustments' are being looked at regarding set-piece defending (Image: Richard Parkes)

“And it just seems as though over the last few weeks, we've conceded a few from that.

“So we've looked at it, we've talked to the players about it, we'll do more work on it before Saturday.

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“What I've found in the past, though, if you make a real big deal of it, everybody gets screwed up as soon as the set play’s given.

“So we're not getting screwed up about it, because the truth is, for a team that’s bottom in the league, we're actually only average in terms of that.

“So it's not a major issue that we need to scrap everything or go back to the drawing board, but we will make slight adjustments to try and make us better.”

Carlisle are 11 points adrift of safety ahead of this weekend’s game and Simpson spoke further about the focus on the training ground since the Orient defeat.

“It’s about us – the focus has been about us and basically being braver, and braver on the football, working harder to retain the football,” he said.

“We reviewed the game at the weekend and showed the players where we felt that, if we were a little bit braver to get on the ball, we could have affected the game more. So that's the focus for this weekend.”