It’s bare-knuckle stuff now

GLOVES OFF FOR ROVERS DEFENDER SAM

- By LOUIS PARR

SAM FINLEY wants Tranmere to shore up defensively and fight their way up the table - as he declared: “The gloves are off!”.

Rovers have managed just four clean sheets to date, and the midfielder insists the team has a collective responsibility to solve the problem.

He said: "We've shown that scoring goals isn’t an issue, it’s keeping them out the back of our net.

"It’s not just on the defence or the goalkeeper, it’s an overall feature that we need to go back to the drawing board and get better at.

"Clean sheets are going to be massive for us going forward and helping us climb the table."

The Whites have conceded 34 goals in 21 matches, with several the result of costly individual errors.