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" We have got a lot of tough football now to come having missed the last two games which is really frustrating for us. We've got I think 11 Saturdays and 16 football matches to find. We even talked about this before the Crewe game went off, saying that it was fine and looked nice in a sense but they take some winning those games. In the shorter time now that we have they are going to take a lot of winning. There is a huge strain on the resources of the football club because if you check as well we have got something like one reserve game every week now through to the end of the season.
" So the squad is really going to be stretched, but, having said that, we have got to see a positive side to that, if we can set off on a good foot on Saturday against Doncaster then that would be a big lift for everybody. Sometimes you can hit these runs, the training becomes minimal and the football matches become important and you can go through them on a high so we've got to try to do that.
" We were aware yesterday of the weather forecast obviously and we knew there was going to be frost. The pitch itself yesterday at around four o'clock in the afternoon, three-quarters of it was excellent, the Warwick Road End was a bit hard but it was OK. We knew we had to get some heaters and stuff on through the night, Fred Story organised that with his men and Dave Mitchell, they got that sorted out.
" This morning I got into the ground just before nine o'clock and myself, the backroom staff and all the youth team were out there pulling covers off and we were working very hard to get the game on. The feeling was that the longer the day went on, the longer the heaters stayed onto the ground and that bottom penalty area we'd have a really good chance of putting the game forward. "
" Even at lunchtime then, we knew there was an inspection by a local referee at 12.30pm but we fully then expected a further inspection at four o'clock with Mike Riley the referee. Mike Riley is a professional referee and with respect that is his job and he wasn't at the ground, and he wasn't due at the ground until four o'clock which is somewhat surprising.
" So we fortunately had the first look at the pitch at 12.30pm with the local referee who deemed some of the areas of that penalty area frozen and not playable. Which was fair enough, it wasn't massive areas but we were of the opinion that given the time with the heaters up until four o'clock that that might change.
" After long consultation with the Football League though the local referee decided, or they decided between them, that the game should go off. So we were pretty frustrated with that as we felt that maybe a further three or four hours just to give it that time to get the work down that that pitch would be OK but it wasn't to be.
" Colin (Calderwood) was at the ground at 12.30pm the same as myself, and we were down on the pitch. I didn't disagree with the referee, there were areas on that pitch that were frozen at that time, but, as I said, we were of the opinion that we had got the equipment and the manpower. Fred Story had organised some of the guys from his company down there, we had got our own groundstaff, everybody was pulling it to get it on. "
" We felt that if we had been offered that extra three or four hours then we could have made some success of the pitch. As I say though, the referee spoke with the Football League for a long length of time on his own, I wasn't privy to that conversation. They erred right on the side of caution pretty much big time and decided then at 12.30pm, much to our frustration, that the game wouldn't go ahead.
" I won't know until we finish the Doncaster game what two weeks off has done. I'm not trying to duck that question but sometimes it can be useful and sometimes it can be a hindrance because we've also had to call the reserve game off tomorrow on the pitch because the weather tonight is going to be right down below six. So we've just shut the place down and said to get back in on Thursday because if they feel like me, the annoyance, the frustration then tomorrow is going to be a dead duck day.
" Then we go into Thursday with everything to look forward to, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. I'm banking on the fact that there are some footballs being kicked in anger on Saturday, not nastily but in frustration, saying let's get going and get playing this football match that we all want to get going ahead. It's a big one, Doncaster Rovers, a team above us in the league and every incentive for us to work at that in the same way we built up for Nottingham Forest.
" They are one of the better footballing teams I think, well they are all top teams in terms of the way they play football, including ourselves, if we get it right then we are a good team ourselves. If we can get it right on the day and Doncaster get it right then there is a real game that will be hard to predict. We look forward to the game, I'm not saying that we owe them one, because I am not in the business of revenge, but we didn't get a very good first-half out of the game at Doncaster not so long ago. "
" The second-half though we picked our game up, had the better of the chances to score and then conceded a really sloppy free-kick in the last five minutes. So it would be nice to get a little bit of repayment on that in terms of a result our way. Dave Mitchell did say that it is likely to rain heavily and be waterlogged, but I think it was a bit of black humour that he was throwing about. We want to get that game going, we've got to play it, we've got to get some football in for everybody.
" I left Sarah (McKnight) and George (Thomson) in the office chasing Nottingham Forest this afternoon to try to come up with a game but we are looking, we are probably having to look into April to try to find a midweek date for that one. Because obviously we have pulled Crewe in pretty quickly next Tuesday and that looks a good decision now, so we will probably have to go into April somewhere but we haven't got it confirmed yet.
" I've travelled south a bit this afternoon since our game went off and, I know that it is no consolation to anybody, but Wolves had a late pitch inspection at six o'clock. I was listening to their BBC radio as I was coming down and their supporters were complaining about the lateness of that one and eventually it did go off. So it is difficult to please people all of the time, they delayed theirs, we called ours off early, I think it's just frustrating all round for everybody when the outcome is that there is no game of football. It's difficult to win though when you've got those problems.
" Paul (Thirwell) was ready to go, he'd played two full reserve games, he'd trained for the last two or three weeks. He's up and ready to go and he'll be disappointed but on the back of that as well it also means that Chris Lumsdon faces another few days without being able to play because his suspension carries over to Saturday now. There are silver linings and disappointments all the way through this little charade that we are going through. So let's get this game on at the weekend and if Thirlwell plays and he's fit and well then he is a good player for us to have around. "