Notts County Manager Neal Ardley has displayed his excitement of getting back down to business as he and his side approach the final few days of ‘match week’ for the first time in over four months.

The Magpies host Barnet in the Playoff semi-finals at Meadow Lane on Saturday and Ardley stated “It’s great, we’re trying to keep everyone calm, everyone watched the game on Saturday and it just gets the juices flowing knowing our league is back on a roll and it’s all going to happen over the next couple of weeks”.

He relayed “It’s hard, you want everyone to be excited but not too excited, you need a sense of calm and we’ve tried to make sure training reflects that and by the time we get to Saturday everyone should know their jobs and what we are about to face and if we can keep the lads relaxed I think that’s going to be the best way for them to go out and perform.”

On facing up against Saturday’s opponents Barnet, Ardley said “I know they rode their luck at times (at Yeovil) but they defended with so much passion and resilience that they earned their luck” with a number of changes expected in the Bees line-up this weekend, Ardley stated “who knows, they could even come up with a plan that’s different but we’ve got flexibility in ours too”.

Having trained on Monday and Tuesday, Notts players enjoy a rest day today but Ardley’s side will be back in on Thursday as the big game day approaches with finishing touches to tactics in mind. Ardley said “we’ve just kept it quite fresh and generic (so far this week), we’ve done some match analysis and reflected on the friendlies we’ve been able to have” Furthering “We need to keep everyone in a good place, we want them to be excited but we want them to be excited with looking forward to the game, not feeling the pressure of what the games about”.

*Main image @Official_NCFC Notts Manager Neal Ardley is looking forward to the Barnet match on Saturday.