Ricketts: Take The Positives

Welsh defender confident an upturn in form is imminent ahead of a busy schedule of fixtures

Sam Ricketts believes he and a recently frustrated Wanderers dressing room should take the positives from their recent performances ahead of a busy festive schedule.

The Welsh defender was happy with Bolton’s performance in the 2-2 draw at Huddersfield last weekend, but admitted that the dressing room was frustrated at emerging from the John Smith’s Stadium with just a point.

The Whites have tasted defeat just once singe Dougie Freedman took over, but Ricketts believes that the team’s recent displays have warranted more wins than have been posted.

Reflecting on Saturday’s game, the defender said: “Performance-wise it was very good, I think we dominated the second half. It’s just disappointing to concede a late goal to again frustrate us and leave us with another draw when we’ve done enough to win the game.

“It’s frustrating because the level we’re playing at is good enough to win games. I think our performances are improving all the time, and the consistency of those performances is getting better too. 

“We should be looking to win every game in this division, that’s the mentality we have to have. There’s no reason why we can’t beat anyone in this league so any game that we play and we don’t win, we’ll look at it afterwards as a disappointment.”

Ricketts also accepted that Wanderers have to be more resilient at the back, with clean sheets proving hard to come by so far this season. He added: “We need to start keeping clean sheets. If you’re not conceding, or just conceding one, you’re always in the game. 

“Unfortunately at the moment we’re conceding two which is meaning we need to score three to win the game, which is difficult. I don’t think that confidence is the issue; I think there’s a huge difference between trying to survive in the Premier League and trying to win every week in this league. 

“There’s a different way of playing but I think we’re very close to putting a very good run of form together. It’s been spoken about recently about how we have to go on and kill games off and like I said, I think our performances have got better and better as the weeks have gone by.

“We have to stick to what we we’ve been doing and that will give us the confidence to keep going, keep taking the game to the opposition.”
Read Time: 3 mins