Chris Beech says Scunthorpe’s struggle for form is irrelevant to how Carlisle United are preparing for tomorrow’s game.

The second-bottom Iron have made a poor start to the League Two season, having picked up just one win and three draws from their opening seven games.

They are also without a victory in their last 12 away games in all competitions.

Beech admits it is not easy to predict how the visitors will line up as a result of their recent fortunes, though he insisted Neil Cox’s side have some “real threats”.

But he said Carlisle’s focus is on themselves as they seek another Brunton Park victory.

Beech said: “In the situation they’re in, we don’t really know which team they’ll play, but whether it’s Scunthorpe, Salford, Swindon, other teams that don’t start with S…it doesn’t really matter.

“It matters what we do and how we do it.

“We’ll try to look to put our mark on the game and, as we’ve seen, we have been strong in parts of games this season.

“We’ll go into Saturday with a game plan. There may be changes from a defeat from last week as we look at different things, and we understand the Scunthorpe strengths, because they do have some real threats, and we absolutely must respect that.

“But if we concentrate on ourselves we know we have very good players who can do very good things, and we have to make sure we have six or seven of them doing it on the same day at the same time.”

Scunthorpe were thrashed 4-0 at home by Exeter last time out.

They have been without ex-Carlisle man Ryan Loft for the last month after the striker suffered a cheekbone injury.

Beech played down the idea that tomorrow was a bigger opportunity for the Blues than if they’d been facing higher-ranked opposition.

“It is an opportunity but I suppose if you look at the fixtures we’ve won, Swindon and Salford, you’d look at that and think maybe that’s not as big an opportunity,” he said.

“In terms of who you’re playing, it’s a little bit irrelevant. It’s all about how you are, what you do, how you represent your energy, attitude and intensity, and if they’re bang on you have any chance of winning any League Two game.

“We have to make sure we’re ready come 3pm."