Neal Bishop believes sticking together is the key to returning to winning ways.
The 36-year-old midfielder was reflecting on Saturday’s 2-0 loss to Oldham Athletic and is confident his side's luck will soon change.
Bishop discussed the result, playing at right-back and putting things right against Wigan in an interview with iFollow Iron.
ON WHY THE IRON COULDN’T GET BACK INTO THE GAME LAST WEEKEND…
NB: I wish I knew. It’s unfortunate and the game was flat. I know there are frustrated people but you’ve got to use times like this to look at the bigger picture. I’m not trying to sit on the fence and give you a load of awful clichés but we are still in a good position. Let’s be honest, the top two are probably out of reach now but it’s all to play for in those play-off places. That’s where we want to be. With ten games left, we have to regroup and do it quickly because there are some tough games to look forward to. We are still in a good position. We know where things need to be addressed and it’s important that we don’t get too negative with each other as a club. We need everyone on side. The time for post mortems in football is at the end of the season when it’s all done and dusted and put to bed. As a club, now is the time to come together and kick on. We have ten games. I can promise everyone out there that the boys are working hard. They’re out on the training pitch, we have video meetings and we will look at everything to try and improve the form. We are confident that it will change. We have the right people, the right staff and a good group of players. The good thing in football is that there is always another game and I wish it was on Tuesday to be honest. It’s going to be a long week but we will have a few words with each other and look forward to putting it right.
ON THE RESULT…
NB: We had some decent enough chances in the first-half. We hit the crossbar and had some at the start of the second too. Then they scored with a huge deflection. I don’t know where that shot was going but it wasn’t going on-target. It hit their lad’s back and went in. There was still time to get back into the game though so we can’t blame that. These things happen. We seemed to lose confidence as a team and we have to be better than that as a group. There was plenty of time to get back into the game and we had a lot of creative players on the pitch. We need to be better at responding to when we go a goal down.
ON HOW TO PUT THINGS RIGHT AGAINST WIGAN…
NB: It’s a perfect game. If you can’t look forward to playing at an ex-Premier League club that are flying high in the league then you shouldn’t be playing football. Therefore, it’s one that we will relish. Bring it on. We will go there and do our best, and hopefully it’ll be good enough. It is going to be a long week but it gives us seven days to put things right. It’s probably a game where people expect a home win so we will perhaps go there as the underdogs. It’s certainly a game that as a group, we will relish.
ON PLAYING AT RIGHT-BACK…
NB: I have played there for half a season for Blackpool in the Championship so it’s not totally foreign. Because of injury and illness in the right-back position, we are down to bare bones a little bit. However, I have enjoyed playing there. I think that I’ve played well there in the past two games and I certainly don’t feel out of place there. People will bring up that we were defeated 2-0 but I thought that we defended well as a team, just like I thought that we did last week at Bristol Rovers. For 90 minutes, they didn’t have a chance. The 91st minute came along and they nicked one. It’s just the way it’s going at the moment. Every team will go through a bad patch but you have to respond quickly so that the season doesn’t peter out. We have worked too hard as a group to let that happen and this is where we have to summon that energy and those reserves that we found in pre-season.
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