As Bristol Rovers travel up the M5/M6 corridor towards Manchester for Saturday's game against Oldham Athletic both managers are looking for a change in attitude by their players.
Bristol Rovers have had a bad start to the season, an opening day defeat at Peterborough was followed by a thrashing at Oxford.
The ship seemed to have steadied with the victory over Yeovil and the emotional 2-2 draw at Exeter. Then came another thrashing, this time 4-0 at home to a Southampton team whose only win that has been.
Paul Trollope has made it clear where he sees deficiencies in his team
Meanwhile Oldham's Paul Dickov is demanding a vast improvement in attitude when his team play this weekend. The Latics slipped to a 1-0 defeat at the hands of Shrewsbury in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy on Tuesday.
Dickov is looking for his men to rediscover the form which has seen them collect eight points from four matches so far this season.
"I want a change of attitude against Bristol Rovers on Saturday," said Dickov. "We need to get back to working harder and closing down from the front and we need a few more leaders on the pitch.
"Teams are coming here and showing us respect as they know we play good football at a high tempo. What teams are doing is getting eight, nine and 10 players behind the ball which means the onus is on us to break them down and we need to be cleverer in doing that.
"It is a big compliment to the boys who have to realise that they have come a long way in a short space of time, as I have also done. We will continue to work hard and we shall get better."
Dickov also stressed the importance of patience saying he has detected a note of anxiety when the team has failed to make an early breakthrough in the last two matches.
He believes had they scored in the opening 20 minutes, he feels they would have won comfortably against Yeovil and Shrewsbury.
"We were at it hammer and tongs for the first 20 minutes in both matches and when it has not happened we have got dejected. We have to be at it for 90 minutes and show patience. If we continue to do the right things then the breaks will come."
Over the years there have been some remarkable games between the teams. There have been 54 matches with 19 Oldham victories, 22 to Rovers and 13 draws. Only 5 of those games have been 0-0 and in one remarkable instance was 4-4.
The first meeting was in the FA Cup on 14 December 1935 as the teams tied 1-1 at Boundary Park, Rovers won the replay 4-1 at Eastville.
That 4-4 draw was on 27 September 1997, in front of a 5,990 crowd. A rampant Oldham team raced into a 3-0 lead, within the first half hour, with goals by Barlow (8 mins and 23 mins) and McCarthy (25 mins).
15 minutes later and Rovers had pegged it back to 3-3 with Beadle (30 mins and 33 mins) and Hayles (45 mins) scoring. Oldham retook the lead with a 59th minute goal by Garner but Rovers were not finished, Cureton slammed home a penalty in the 87th minute.
Last season both home teams won by a single goal. Previously Rovers completed a 2-0 double over the Latics which bettered the previous season's 1-0 double!
Prior to that Rovers' last victory at Boundary Park was on 26 February 2000 as Rovers raced towards what appeared to be a certain automatic promotion.
With goals by Cureton (4 mins and 6 mins, penalty) and Astafjevs (11 mins) seeming to have sown the game up for Rovers within the first 15 minutes.
A further goal by Thomson (48 mins) just after half time gave the Gas an unassailable lead and Oldham's only response was a goal by Dudley in the 67th minute.
One player at Oldhame enjoying a new 'lease of life is Jason Jarrett. The 30-year-old has been an unlikely success at centre-half this season, having never played at the back before.
A pre-season trial yielded a six-month contract for Jarrett, something which he wants to extend if possible. Having had a previous loan spell at Boundary Park in 2008 where John Sheridan deployed him in his usual midfield role.
Moves to Brighton and Hove Albion and Port Vale followed, only for the latter move to turn sour at the end of 2009 when he was not offered an extension to his initial short-term contract.
Six months out of football were enough to whet his appetite again even if he did not expect a new role. "The manager must have seen something in pre-season to play me at the back but it's worked out really well," he admitted.
"I've really enjoyed playing alongside Reuben (Hazell) and now I think I'm a centre-back rather than a midfielder. My career hadn't panned out the way I wanted and I let it get to me; I needed some time out and, fortunately, it worked out."
Talking after last week-end's game Paul Dickov was left with mixed feelings after the 0-0 home draw with Yeovil. Although Dickov was disappointed that his side could not find the cutting edge to kill off the visitors, he was pleased with the fact that his defence managed to keep a clean sheet.
Oldham had the best of the opening 45 minutes but could not find a way through, but it was the away side who finished the stronger of the two sides, but the back line remained intact.
"I'm disappointed we haven`t won the game but you have to give Yeovil credit," Dickov said, "They defended well and put in a good performance whereas we defended reasonably well but I was somewhat disappointed with our attacking play throughout the afternoon.
"I can`t remember their keeper having a save to make in the second half; we`ll work out whether that was poor attacking or their defending but it`s a clean sheet and we`ll move on."
Paul Trollope will be hoping that his team can also keep their first clean sheet of the season this weekend.
With the rush to get keeper Mikkel Andersen back from a Danish Under 21 match on Friday in time to play he is acutely aware that they will need to be on top of their game to do that.
Written by Gerry Prewett.
