"WE'RE ALL PULLING IN THE SAME DIRECTION" SAYS ROBERTS

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Right-back talks team togetherness following Stoke City win

2024-12-01T10:00:00.000Z

"WE'RE ALL PULLING IN THE SAME DIRECTION" SAYS ROBERTS

Right-back talks team togetherness following Stoke City win

2024-12-01T10:00:00.000Z

Right-back talks team togetherness following Stoke City win

Connor Roberts thinks the Clarets took a positive step forward in showing real consistency after Saturday afternoon's win at Stoke City.

Reflecting at the end of a three-game week which saw the team secure nine points and five clean sheets on the bounce, the Welshman was keen to keep building on the positive momentum.

“It’s a good result, the one we wanted coming into it, a really good week for us. Four wins on the bounce is always good and I think teams that are going to end up at the top of the table come the end of the season are the teams who are most consistent and obviously put together as many wins as possible. So, we’ve taken a nice step towards doing that hopefully. We need to just keep building on it and try to be as consistent as possible."

Burnley arrived at the bet365 Stadium in good form, but it was the home side who came close to going ahead first with Roberts, James Trafford, and CJ Egan-Riley all having to make vital blocks and clearances in the first half.

“We’re a team. We’ll need players, individuals, to produce moments like Traff, like CJ has done in the last few games. We relied on them in the first half, a couple of clearances and good defending.

"WE'RE ALL PULLING IN THE SAME DIRECTION" SAYS ROBERTS - Image 1

“When we get the chances which we’ve been getting in the last few games we have to put at least one of them in. I think when we did that, they had a little spell second half, I thought we controlled the game. At the back end and, when we had that first goal, I think they were a bit defeated by then, so we just needed to keep our foot on the gas. It was a really good 2-0 win.”

The victory saw the visitors seal a fifth consecutive clean sheet increasing the tally to 12 this season and, like his teammates, Roberts was keen to emphasise it's a real team effort and everyone plays their part.

“You need a little bit of luck as well along the way, but I think a lot of the boys who’ve played in defence, midfield and up front, help us. We press from the front, we defend from the front, and if the whole team doesn’t run back and defend then we’ll probably concede more goals than we have. The longer we can go without conceding a goal brilliant, but we just need to keep on working together, keep doing the habits that have been ingrained into us over the last few years, not just this season. If we keep a clean sheet, then we give ourselves half a chance.”

With the positive stats of late, as one of the more experienced players in the group, how much does Roberts believe the team are gelling as a squad?

"WE'RE ALL PULLING IN THE SAME DIRECTION" SAYS ROBERTS - Image 2

“There’s been a lot of change since I’ve been here, I’ve only been here nearly four years and about 300 players have come and gone! I’ve had four different managers myself. It’s been quite the turnaround, but we just need the players like me, like Josh Cullen, Josh Brownhill, who’ve been here quite a long time, been here through all those changes. We have to take what we’ve learnt and try and feed it into the younger lads, or the newer lads who haven’t been here quite as long, and try and get them on the same direction as everyone else. I do think over the last few games we’ve shown that people are learning, people are getting onboard and we’re rolling in the same direction.”

The 29-year-old added there may be bumps along the way, but building consistency will be the key to bringing success come the end of the season.

“The number of players we let go, the changes we’ve had, I’m not sure there’s as much pressure on us. A couple of other teams maybe but it’s consistency that’s key. We’ll go weeks where we perhaps don’t score, perhaps don’t play very well, we don’t win, we don’t pick up as many points as we’d like to, like the start of the season. But it’s getting to a point, and getting to that consistency, that carries you through. The team that stays the most consistent from now until the end of the season will be the team that gets promoted.”