LAST Saturday’s game against Portsmouth was a really good indicator to me of how our squad measures up against other teams who are pushing to be competing at the business end of the league come the end of the season.

Pompey have one of, if not, the most competitive budgets in League Two and an unbelievable following for this level, so the game answered a lot of questions in terms of what we are up against.

The feeling in the dressing room after the game was one of frustration and this was reiterated when watching the match back on Monday.

Sometimes things get lost in the emotion of a live game, so we always look at it again and the staff felt we had put in a strong performance, particularly in the first half, that we should have converted into three points.

People are always keen to tell me our position in the league, but we made a conscious decision pre-season to take the onus away from checking the table after each game.

Instead, we have set targets to meet within blocks of games to make sure we end up where we want to be come the final day of the season.

It helps us take the focus away from what everyone else is doing and bring it back to ourselves and what we need to do.

We are on track to meet our points quota for this period and will welcome Morecambe with that in mind.

Today’s game should be another challenge for us, with Morecambe matching our points tally, but having scored more goals.

They are a side people can tend to overlook, but this gives them the chance to play with the freedom of having no pressure on them, as they aren’t expected to finish in the play-offs or to gain promotion which makes them dangerous opponents.

We have had an uneventful week in terms of training, which any manager, especially one with a relatively small squad, will tell you is a good thing. Callum O’Dowda has trained all week after he was substituted on Saturday due to a head injury.

Patrick Hoban and Ryan Taylor both scored during the midweek development game which is encouraging as they are two players who are always pushing for a place in the starting 11.

A big boost to the players this season has been the turn-around in our home form, with an unbeaten run of two wins and two draws at the Kassam Stadium.

We are hoping to create a fortress that other teams are nervous of visiting, and a huge part of that is obviously the support from the fans.

Off the pitch, we have had an exciting week with a United in Business leadership masterclass, with guest-speaker General Sir Nicholas Parker, from the British Army, and our own chairman Darryl Eales.

Nights like these are what makes this such a special club, because although my focus is always going to be about what happens on the pitch it’s great to see the football club in context as part of the community.

I send my congratulations to Carlisle United for their terrific display in the Capital One Cup.

They flew the flag for League Two football earlier in the week forcing Liverpool to penalties in their third-round clash at Anfield.

The shock result was Newcastle United’s home defeat to Sheffield Wednesday, which I suppose should ease the pain of them knocking us out in the previous round.