Saddlers midfielder Ross Tierney is keen to take the positives from Tuesday’s performance against Championship side Blackburn Rovers into the first home game of the League Two season on Saturday against Stockport County.
The 22-year-old scored his first goal for the Club in Tuesday’s defeat against Rovers on his debut and was pleased to get some valuable minutes under his belt having made his first start since February 2023.
And now the loanee is hopeful that the side can build on the overall performance which was an encouraging one on the whole.
“Going into the game, it looked like Blackburn were a young team but coming off the back of it, they were a good passing team,” said Tierney. “I don’t think we will come up against many teams that will play like that in our league.
“The goal is a plus but I just want to play minutes. I was excited to start a game, I haven’t started a game since February so the legs were a bit tired.
“I looked up at the clock and it was quite early on and I was tired but I was happy to get a goal. Then for RAM (Ronan Maher) and Oisin McEntee goals as well, it was a good night for the Irish boys.
“It felt weird (to start the game). I was having a bit of a joke with Jez (Jack Earing) at home before the game.
“I think it is only a month between mine and his last start and he has done his ACL so we made a bit of a joke but I need to play minutes and thankfully I got a lot of minutes tonight.
“We realised from the first 10-15 minutes that they were a decent side and we tried to sit off and then we knew that once we did win the ball back we would have spaces if we kept the ball as much as we could.
“At the end of the day, it’s good to score three goals against a Championship side.
“Although they were a young team, they were a decent side and hopefully we can take the performance into Saturday.”