Leyton Orient winger Lee Cook spoke to the East London and West Essex Guardian ahead of his side's League One match against Carlisle at the Matchroom Stadium tomorrow afternoon, Cook suggesting the O's still have promotion to chase this season:
“Getting to the play-offs is definitely achievable and when you think over the season of the points we’ve chucked away it’s annoying. But it’s a tough league and you get tough battles like the one in midweek against Portsmouth. We’ve got eight games left so I think we’re probably going to have to win 90 per cent of those games. We’re going to have a go at it and I don’t see why we can’t looking at our fixtures.
“From a neutral point of view you’d say ‘they could win every single game’ because there’s no one in the top six so we're going to have a go. That’s what the gaffer (Russell Slade) bedded into us to keep concentrating and that’s what we want to achieve so let’s see if we can do it. Even Sheffield United and Doncaster, when we’ve played them, have not been impressive.
“It does frustrate you because all season we’ve chucked points away where we should have won or got a point. The latest one was Hartlepool whereas if we’d won that we’d be three points away [from the play-offs]. But we're going to keep going and the gaffer’s doing wonders here so we’ll keep going and see what we can achieve. It is a decent squad for this league and although it’s small we’ve got quality in there. We’ve got quality in the back four, up front and in midfield.
“It’s generally a good squad although it’s one of the lower budgets in the league. I think the gaffer’s done well with what he’s got and there wouldn’t be many players in the squad you’d change. It’s just about getting that consistency of results in this division and getting a winning mentality which we did earlier with eight wins on the bounce. Let’s get another eight wins in a row and if we do that we’ll be bang in there for the play-offs, so let’s go for it.”
In team news for the O’s tomorrow goalkeeper Lee Butcher is currently sidelined with a troublesome long-term knee problem, while centre-back Mathieu Baudry is also out after picking up a hip injury during the 1-0 home win over Portsmouth on Tuesday. Finally fellow centre-half Nathan Clarke is rated as 50-50 to be in action against Carlisle as he struggles with a rib injury, and striker David Mooney has been absent recently with a thigh problem.
The referee for tomorrow's match is Simon Hooper from Swindon and he will be assisted down the lines by Adrian Gillett from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire and John Magill from Colchester. Meanwhile the fourth official is Paul Kelly from Walderslade in Kent.