Rosler: People want my Fleetwood high-flyers to fall

Rosler’s team are the season’s surprise package and they overtook Bolton with a 3-0 home win over a physical Northampton.

A crunch fortnight lies ahead, with a trip to ex-Fleetwood boss Graham Alexander’s second-placed Scunthorpe, who are aboveTown only on goal difference, followed by Bolton’s visit to Highbury.

Rosler again stressed the target is simply to beat the club’s record League One points tally of 63 set two seasons ago, but the head coach warned Town must avoid falling into traps.

He said: “I told the players a lot of people don’t want us to be up there.

“A lot of people think, ‘Oh Fleetwood, should they be up there? It should be Charlton, Millwall, Bolton ... all the big clubs.’ So there are a lot of traps out there for us and we need to be sure we are not going in those traps.”

Devante Cole, Bobby Grant and David Ball’s goals clinched the 3-0 win and ex-striker Rosler was happy with his side’s clinical finishing, the Cobblers having wasted four clear-cut chances before Cole opened the scoring in the 42nd minute.

The Town boss added: “We knew we would get those moments because that was the way they were setting up, but it was all about us taking the chances and we did. We were clinical – great finishes.

“I was very happy for 70 minutes but in the first 20 minutes we were in trouble against a very strong Northampton team. It took us too long to adapt, too long to handle their physicality.

“It took us too long to set a proper line and get the ball out of their pressing areas, and after that we managed it really well.”

Rosler was not too happy with the Cobblers’ physical approach in the swirling wind at Highbury and added: “They looked a real threat. I think in the first half the conditions played into their hands, which made it very difficult for us.

“We didn’t judge the line in defence for their long balls and I think the way they got physical on our players at times was borderline.

“The referee didn’t let it go on too much because sometimes there was no intention to go for the ball, just intention to take our player out.

“In my humble opinion there were many fouls for the long balls but they did it very well.

“We rode our luck a little bit in that period and they should have been up.

“Alex Cairns made a fantastic save but after 20 minutes you could see what we trained on.

“We got the ball down. We exposed them in midfield in wide areas. We got control of the game and I felt in the second half, when the conditions did not play a major part, we were the better team. In the second half we won deservedly 3-0.”