JUSTIN Edinburgh is targeting an improvement in quality ahead of County’s vital visit to Plainmoor tomorrow, writes Michael Pearlman.

The Exiles travel to one of the two sides in the bottom two of League Two knowing that with each passing defeat – Newport have won only once in their last 15 – they risk slipping ever closer to the relegation zone.

County missed a penalty and hit the woodwork in Wednesday’s 2-1 defeat to Dagenham and Edinburgh admits that effort and endeavour simply isn’t going to be enough to save his side.

“The penalty was a massive moment, if it goes 1-1 it is a different game but it went 2-0 and we’ve hit the post, gone in at 2-1 and we are always chasing the game,” he said.

“I credit the players for the effort and the commitment they showed, but they’ve got to do more than that now, we need a little bit more quality, more guile and more know how to rediscover how to win a football match, which is easier said than done at this time.

“I think the fans are completely behind the players, they are seeing they are giving everything, but we need more than that, we need to put our chances away and stop being soft in the goals that we are conceding.

“It’s going to be a tough game on Saturday, but it’s one where we need to get a result.

“All nine games remaining are vital and we have to amalgamate as many points as we can.”

Edinburgh felt County were at least dominant in the second half on Wednesday.

“In the second half we were camped in their half but as long as we continue to apply ourselves correctly, we’ve got to have the belief we will turn it around,” he said.

“I thought we got the foundations here on Sunday and we started well on Tuesday night but now we need a result.

“We were back in (for training) yesterday and now we have to dust ourselves down and get on with things and look to Saturday.”