Mark Robins paid compliments to Saturday’s opponents Leyton Orient’s large squad by claiming the money the London club have invested in players has been used wisely.
Talking to the press, Robins also believes that O’s boss Fabio Liverani could keep him guessing right until kick-off with the amount of players the Italian has at his disposal.Robins told The Iron Player: “We’ve looked at the Leyton Orient squad, and it’s a vast, expansive, and expensively assembled side.
"It’s all of those things and there are some good players in there. It’s difficult to say who the key players are because the squad is big; they could pick anybody from that pool of players.
"They’ve got a talented group of players there, and we know Chris Dagnall as he’s been here before, while David Mooney is there and he does a good job for them.
"Jobi McAnuff is there too, as well as Darius Henderson; you could go through them all really, they have some real experience at this level. We just need to concentrate on us and what we are capable of.”
Dean Cox has been pinpointed as the key to Orient’s attacking threat, with four goals and ten assists so far this season, with two goals coming in his last four games, and Robins spoke about his ability and experience in League One.
Robins added: “He’s clearly experienced at that level, he’s got good quality and can put a great ball in to the area.
"They have a number of players like Ryan Hedges on-loan who is a really exciting prospect and they’ve just brought in from Neal Eardley who was previously at Blackpool, which is another shrewd signing which has added to their numbers.
"They’ve got other players in there that can do a real job for them so like I said until we get the team sheet we won’t know what they are going to do, so we’ll focus on us.”
Talking about his own side, Robins was delighted to confirm there are no new injury doubts for the Iron, apart from one integral part of the coaching staff.
Robins joked: “Me personally I’m struggling with a knee injury, it’ll probably keep me out for the rest of my career!
"The players all seem to be doing okay. We’ve had a second day’s recovery yesterday, it's active recovery so they’ve been working, but it’s a slightly different type of work, strength and conditioning along with all the other little bits and pieces that will help keep them fit for the rest of the season.
"We’ve got a decent squad both in terms of quality and numbers to pick from so all is fine.”
With Niall Canavan making his first start for four months in the Scunthorpe back line on Tuesday, Robins refused to be drawn in to speculation over who would, and who wouldn’t keep their places in the starting XI.
Robins said: “We’ll have to wait and see. There’s no way I can give away any team information until 2.00pm on Saturday.
"It’s a game where we are going to have to be bang on our game, and we need to go and compete as we have been doing.
"We can cause teams problems, we know that, but I need to reiterate that this squad is a good squad, and they could be anything on the day. People are pushing for starts, and that can only be good for us as long as they maintain the mind sets they need to succeed.
"We have to try and get back out on the grass more in training soon, again when the snow subsides. We have to make sure we are professional as we can be, and try and cause them as many problems as we can do.
"We’ve been in really good form away from home, ever since I’ve came in really so we need to try and maintain that and try and add to our points tally.”
Due to a hectic winter schedule, Robins admits he hasn’t seen a lot of Liverani’s side in person, but has had eyes up and down the country reporting back to him with news about way Orient play.
Robins stated: “My view on their play is very limited as I’ve not seen a lot of them.
"I’ve not seen them live; I’ve seen them on footage because I haven’t had a lot of opportunities to see them live.
"We’ve had them watched quite a lot so I’ve had that information come to me, but we know their players, we know what they are capable of doing, and there’s some really good talent there.
"We’ve got to make sure it’s all about us and we make the game about us, which we are well capable of because we know far more about each other.”