TERRY Butcher has told his Newport County AFC players that they will need to raise their game again to beat Stevenage tomorrow afternoon, writes Andrew Penman.

The Exiles boss felt his team played well “up to a point” at Cambridge United in last week’s League Two opener but the record books will show a 3-0 defeat.

And Butcher was delighted with an impressive showing in a narrow 2-1 Capital One Cup loss at Championship Wolves on Tuesday.

But now he is demanding that his new-look side puts some points on the board in his first competitive match in charge at Rodney Parade.

“I’ve told the players that their level of performance has to be equal to what it was at Wolves, if not higher against Stevenage,” said Butcher.

“It will be more physical and a lot quicker tempo than the Wolves match.

“What we don’t want to do is to have a performance on Tuesday and then not have the same quality and level of performance in front of our fans.

“The fans have waited a long time to see their team at home and we want to give them something to cheer about and something so they look forward to coming back to Rodney Parade as well.”

Butcher’s only previous home game in charge was the friendly with Queens Park Rangers – a 0-0 draw on a wet and wild July afternoon.

“It was very wet against QPR and the noise then was excellent and with the news of the takeover this week you sense a new dawn and a sense of optimism at the club so hopefully the fans will buy into that as well,” he said.

“The boys are certainly looking forward to playing at home and I’m looking forward to it as well.

“When you’re on the road you feel like you’ve been on the coach every day of the week.

“We’ve had some long journeys and some late nights but it’s nice now that we’ve got one home game before we go to Hartlepool [on Tuesday].

“We want to be strong at home, we want to make it a place teams don’t like coming to and that starts now.”