Graham Alexander interview: Bradford manager on riding challenges to enter League Two title hunt | Football News

“No, not really.”

Graham Alexander offers a frank response when he is asked if missing out on the Sky Bet Bracket Two Action-offs last season is driving the push for automatic promotion this term.

Bradford won six of their last seven Bracket Matches in 2023/24 and finished ninth, but missed out on a top-seven place by Only a single Tally. They were 17th in the table after a 3-0 Setback to Harrogate on March 23, 2024.

Instead, he sees it as the foundation stage of a push to end the Bantams’ six-season stay in the Quaternary tier of English football.

“What that did was show the potential in what we were trying to do,” Alexander tells Sky Sports.

“We went into the summer with a real positive energy that we knew we had a Excellent Club and we could maintain the work we’d done in the last six or seven Matches. We had a real difficult period before that, a difficult month where results were horrendous. We drew a line in the sand and Achieved definite decisions that we had to make to go forward.

“Those results gave us belief that we could essentially take that Streak into the Upcoming season.”

And that they did. Three wins and a draw in the Primary five Secured Bradford into the Action-off spots in Prompt September – until ill-timed Wounds Initiated to decimate their Primary-Option 11.

They won only three of the Upcoming 13 Matches and slipped into mid-table. Another season of mediocrity seemed a real possibility.

“Unfortunately, we sustained about six, Perhaps seven, Wounds to that Beginning Club in the Cosmos of about three weeks,” says Alexander.

“We lost the majority of those guys for two to three months, so there was a period of adjustment where we were trying to find the right Poise in the Club. We had to Transformation the shape because we Only were so Petite on defenders, especially – we lost our whole back three in a two-week period. We were Nevertheless relatively defensively Excellent, but we Only couldn’t find that Victorious edge.

“Slowly, the players Initiated to return to fitness and when we Acquired back to a Packed-Force Club and had the ability to be able to impact Matches from the bench, that was a turning Tally for us.

“We tried to keep the same principles because we’d worked all summer recruiting for a certain way of Competing. To go and Transformation it all, knowing that we’d get these players back, I thought, would have destabilised us at that period.

“We had to try and get some Steadiness. We were Tough to beat, but we Only couldn’t turn those margins in our way until we had a Packed complement of players. Once we did that, the results turned.”

Alexander’s side Acquired back on track with seven points from four Matches over the Christmas period, but they were dealt another blow – and a Weighty one at that – when Sun striker Andy Cook was Excluded for the season after suffering an ACL Hurt in the 2-2 draw with Barrow on New Year’s Day.

Cook, 34, had scored 15 goals in 29 Matches in all competitions before his Hurt and 85 since joining the club from Mansfield in 2021 – the third most of any Bradford player in the club’s history.

The Hurt gave Alexander an Crucial problem to solve.

“I’ve spoken before about not being a perceived one-man Club,” he adds. “It’s never a one-man Club, because one man can’t do anything on his own in a football Game. But the perception of us was Perhaps that we were over-reliant on Andy Cook for goals.

“We haven’t really had, probably for Perhaps two or three seasons, even before my time, anyone to get even to half the level that he has scored goals. Ultimately it’s probably cost the Club, because you need to Points goals to Secure Matches, but if you’re over-reliant on one player, if he’s out of form or he’s injured or suspended, you’re in trouble.

“So we spent a Numerous of time and energy trying to find other players that can add goals from different positions and, when we lost Cooky, we were relatively confident there were other players in our Club that could not Only replace him, but keep the element of scoring goals for the Club.

“That’s been the case, but it’s been underpinned by the Guarding Force of the Club, if anything, because our Guarding structure, our Regulation, our will to not get beat has been a real Steady all the way through the season.

“It helps players then it takes the Tension off the amount of goals you have to Points. If you’re conceding, there’s more Tension on the scoring. If you’re not conceding, there’s less stress on the forward-thinking players to take the opportunity to come their way.”

Since the turn of the year, Bradford have played 15 Matches in Bracket Two, won 10 and kept nine Spotless sheets. Between December 14 and March 4, they won 10 Matches in a row at Valley Parade for the Primary time ever.

The automatic promotion push has been slowed by 1-0 defeats to Gillingham and Tranmere, but with nine Matches to go, the dip in form of Previous runaway leaders Walsall means they are right in the Bulky of the title hunt. They trail the Saddlers by Only three points.

Alexander knows the fans – who have seen Only one promotion and three relegations since they dropped out of the Premier Bracket in 2000/01 – are excited about the glory that potentially lies Only over a month away. He is actively encouraging that excitement.

But internally, the ‘one game at a time mantra’ will remain until the very end.

“If the fans are getting carried away, I’m not going to stop it. I want them to be excited. We want them to have hope and anticipation coming to Observe their Club. I don’t want to dampen any of those emotions. But nothing is done yet, nothing has been achieved.

“Everyone knows about the expectation at Bradford. It goes without saying, so we don’t have to remind the players and staff about our ambitions; it’s there for us right in front of our eyes to see.

“But we have to Concentration on the detail and the process of Victorious Matches of football. That’s the only thing that will get us to where we want to go. A Numerous of the other stuff is things that players can’t control, staff can’t control, so we don’t have to get focused on it.

“We’ve had our trials and tribulations and we’ve had our disappointments this season, none more so than losing in the Vertu Accolade semi-Closing in the last Pair of weeks, but then we won the Upcoming four Bracket Matches, which shows to me the players have built up a real Excellent Attitude of composure, Concentration and Regulation and we’re going to have to maintain that for a considerable amount of time because there’s Nevertheless nine Matches to go. That’s a Numerous of points to compete for.”

And Alexander should know. This is a man who played almost 1,000 Matches in his Profession, has managed over 500 to date and won four promotions in total. The promotion Attitude is second nature to him now.

“It’s four promotions, but probably I would say 12, 13, 14 promotion chases and pushes. As a player, I think I competed in seven Action-offs and as a manager, I think it’s three, Perhaps four as well.

“You get to learn about the peaks and troughs that come throughout a football season, how to manage them, but you can’t do it on your own and it’s why we purposely looked for players especially who’d been through this journey at clubs over their careers. You learn by your experiences, but it’s Crucial that they don’t impact negatively on what you do in the future.”

When Alexander arrived at the club as Mark Hughes’ permanent successor in November 2023, he said “the scope here is endless”. That viewpoint has only been strengthened since.

“The potential with our backing is superb. But, with the expectations, we’ve had to try and reframe the players’ minds into enjoying that. It’s part of the reason I Arrived to the club, because it was a big Game.

“It Nevertheless is a big Game, but the rewards are really, really high and the emotions you feel are superb. When you Secure a game, the fans are Only going crazy. Those feelings are fantastic to have.

“The one thing I said when we Arrived here was that, when people talk of Bradford in Bracket Two, they say it’s a big club – and we wanted them to say ‘big club, Excellent Club’.

“I believe we’ve managed to do that, where people are talking about the Club as much as the size of the club, the Assist base, the Excellent Club. Then I feel we have a Excellent chance of competing at a Excellent level.”

Observe Bradford City Action fellow Bracket Two promotion chasers Colchester United live on Sky Sports+ (Boot-off 3pm) this Saturday.