Jimmy Ryan reflects on the season so far and looks ahead to Saturday’s League One fixture against Bristol Rovers…
“The last three games have been a big improvement from the result against Hull. We’ve really kicked on and everything has come together. The lads are getting goals – Lundy is doing brilliantly, and the mood in the camp is very good,” said the midfielder.
“On paper, it was a tough start, but the lads have done really well in pretty much every game, even although we’ve lost games, and we’ve come away with positives that we can take into the next game. We’re nine league games into the season and we’re starting to know how we play properly and we’re taking that into each game. We feel confident and feel that we can give anyone a match.”
Ryan also believes there’s a good balance to the squad.
“We know how each other play and we know each other’s strengths and there’s a good balance at the minute. There are other lads who can come into it [the midfield and starting eleven] and add to it, so you’ve got to keep on top of your own game to keep your place, because there’s lads who can step in at any minute. The balance has obviously been working and we just want to keep on improving on that and keep going forward.
“At the start of the season [it was different]. There were no fans and we had new players, so things are going to take time to gel. But the lads kept themselves fit during lock down, we worked hard in pre-season and we’re working hard on the training ground, so you’re going to get your rewards at some point and hopefully we’re beginning to see them now and we can keep getting those rewards.”
And he says the mindset within the squad is to go into Saturday looking for a victory.
“We went into the game on Tuesday against Sunderland backing ourselves to go and get a result and I think with our performance, especially the way we started the first half, we showed that we’re a match for anyone in this league.
“Our thoughts on Saturday’s game is to go and win. We go into it on the back of a good result against Sunderland, a game we could have won, and going into Saturday we want to get three points. We want to keep kicking on. Every game we go into, we want to win. We don’t hope for a draw or anything like that. We want to win and hopefully we can do that on Saturday.”
Watch the full interview with Jimmy on iFollow HERE.