Beardsley eyeing Blackburn victory

United eased past Bristol City with a 4-0 win in the Premier League Cup on Monday, with Haris Vuckic bagging a brace and Victor Fernandez and Jamie Holmes scoring one apiece.

Beardsley was impressed with their performance and way his youngsters responded to their Northumberland Senior Cup defeat to North Shields, and with Rovers the visitors for the Premier League 2 Division Two clash, he hopes his charges will be able to shine once more as they seek back-to-back league wins.

“You can never guarantee that two games are going to be the same, as we’ve seen. We played really well at West Brom, then lost to North Shields and obviously did well on Monday,” he told nufc.co.uk.

“It’ll be interesting because we went from (playing on) Monday to Thursday last week, and now we’re going Monday to Friday. Hopefully they’ll be suitably rested, refreshed and ready to go again.

“They are a good group – they’re very genuine. They had a bad night (at North Shields), and it can happen. It’s disappointing that it happened, but we’ve now put it right and hopefully they’ll move on from here.”

The Magpies, who have a number of players with first team experience in their ranks at present, are currently third in the division, and are on course to secure a play-off place if their impressive form continues to the season’s end.

“As much as there’s nothing wrong with the league we’re in, if you had a choice between the top league or the second league, you’d always want to go into the top league, whoever you are,” explained Beardsley. “We do want to be in the top league, and having the chance of making the play-offs keeps the season going a bit longer.

“When you look at it, we have what I’d call senior players now; Stuart Findlay and Curtis Good have been outstanding as a pair, Dan (Barlaser) and Yasin (Ben El-Mhanni) have played in two FA Cup ties so for them it’s brilliant, and going forward I think it’s a really good, positive thing.”

Blackburn, meanwhile, have won their last two league outings, but Beardsley is hoping his side’s momentum will aid them as they look for three points on Friday.

“Blackburn are always organised and disciplined, and a good set of lads,” he said. “We played them down there and we did well.

“It’s never a classic, but its game we have to win. Some of the football we’ve played lately has been really good, so because of that, hopefully we’ll take advantage of the situation.”

And the United legend has also been encouraged by the displays of new boy Victor Fernandez, who impressed against the Robins on Monday.

“He’s done really well. He was involved in three of the four goals the other day, so it was a good start for him,” said Beardsley. “At West Brom, we probably threw him in the deep end but he did OK. We were never going to give him more than an hour, so it wasn’t a negative thing for him to come off.

“It’s a long time since he’s played any football and especially at this level, because the pace of this game compared to where he’s come from is a big, big jump.

“But he’s a nice kid, speaks good English and he’s been good to have around.”