Jimmy McNulty sees room for improvement after Stockport put five past Wycombe

Stockport manager Jimmy McNulty still saw room for improvement in his side despite watching them thrash Wycombe 5-1 to move up to third place in the League One table.

A brace from Harry Wood put the Hatters 2-0 up, and although Cauley Woodrow pulled one back prior to half-time, goals for Kyle Wootton, Jack Diamond and Mikael Mandron sealed a well-deserved victory.

McNulty was delighted with his team’s performance overall, but felt they overplayed at times when holding a commanding lead before the break.

“It was a very good performance,” he said. “My focus is on how good we are in all phases of the game, all of the time.

“It’s important not to focus too heavily on the scoreline, even though I know that’s what’s really important to everybody.

“I kind of like to try and let that take care of itself and see if we’re performing in all phases. And today we were very good in all phases of the game.

“I would accuse the team of maybe being slightly indulgent up to a period in the game where potentially they were finding it a little bit too easy and therefore trying a little bit too much, which stung us with the goal we conceded.

“Their goal was maybe a good moment for the team, but the performance generally was excellent – very similar to last week’s performance if I’m being honest, just a different scoreline.”

County now have six points from their opening three matches, while winless Wycombe have just two and find themselves in the relegation zone.

Chairboys boss Michael Duff gave a scathing assessment of his side’s display.

“We were nowhere near good enough,” he said. “You’ve got no chance of winning any game of football if you get outfought and outrun, which is exactly what happened today.

“Their duels are double the percentage of ours, their aerial duels are double the percentage of ours, their ground duels are double the percentage of ours.

“They’ve blocked five shots, we’ve blocked one. They’ve had seven shots on target and scored five. We’ve had five on target and scored one, so every part of the game wasn’t good enough.

“You can talk about formations, teams and players – if you’re not prepared to fight, you’ve got no chance.

“I warned the players that Stockport are a good team, they are a good team. But for the second goal, he (Wood) has just walked through five of our players like they’re not there. It’s difficult.

“The same thing with the third and fourth goals, exactly the same. It’s undefendable to be honest.”