Left-back Luke Garbutt says he and his team-mates have to dust themselves down and put last night’s disappointing FA Cup exit to Coventry City behind them when fifth-placed Bristol Rovers visit Portman Road for what he believes is a “massive game” on Saturday afternoon.
Garbutt came on as a half-time sub and netted Town’s late goal, his fifth of the season, as the Blues staged a late fightback against the Sky Blues but were ultimately unable to find an equaliser.
After the match, manager Paul Lambert pulled no punches in his assessment of the performance, which he said was the worst since he has been at the club.
But Garbutt says the display shouldn’t be taken in isolation with Town not having had too many similar evenings so far this season.
"Obviously we want to go into every game to win, but we’ve got to look at the bigger picture. We’ve not had too many bad days,” the on-loan Everton man said.
"The priority is this league, it’s a massive game on Saturday and we want to get back to winning ways.
"I think the lads have got to just dust ourselves down and be in a positive frame of mind going into the game. OK, we didn’t play well today, we’ve just got to put that behind us.
"Most of the time this season we’ve played well and got the result we wanted, so I wouldn’t be too downbeat but obviously it’s disappointing to go out of the cup.”
Reflecting on his goal and Town’s late push for a leveller, the 26-year-old admitted that would have been harsh on the Sky Blues, who had been the better side, particularly in the first half.
"We would have liked to have converted Judgey’s chance at the end, whether we would have deserved it is another matter, but football’s a weird game and sometimes you get things you don’t deserve,” he reflected.
"I think, on the whole, we just ned to regroup, the mentality is key going into the game on Saturday and trying to get the three points.”
He added: "We’ll probably have a meeting over the next couple of days, we’ll talk about a few things and obviously try and eliminate the things we’ve done badly tonight and go into that game with a full mindset of wanting to win and play well, of dominating the game and playing on the front foot, getting the crowd going.
"All the things that we’ve been doing most of the season, getting back to that type of style of football, which I’m absolutely confident we're going to do. We just need to forget about this game and move on.”
Having had a stop-start spell where there have been more FA Cup and Leasing.com Trophy matches than league games, the Blues, second behind leaders Wycombe by four points with a game in hand, now going into an uninterrupted run of five back-to-back League One fixtures.
"That’s football, that’s the Football League, it’s relentless,” Garbutt continued. "We’ve obviously had a couple of international breaks and we’re starting to catch up with all the games. If we can string a few really good results together that’s going to push us into a great, great position.
"We’re already in a good position as it is, so for me personally I will be saying to the lads that we don’t want to take this to heart too much.
"Obviously we don’t want to lose football matches and we don’t want to go out of the cup, but the league is our priority and we want to get out of this league and we want to play Championship football next year.
"The changing room tonight is obviously very down and that’s going to be the case because we didn’t play well, we didn’t really get a foothold in the game at any point, so it’s disappointing, but the overall picture of the season is looking really positive and we’ve just got to keep going.”
There were muted boos at half-time on Tuesday night and sarcastic cheering of a rare second-half shot on target but Garbutt expects the crowd to get behind their team on Saturday.
"The support’s been magnificent all season, in the league, and the away following’s been brilliant,” he said. "We’ve just got to keep that going, get the crowd onside, which I’m sure we will do, and play on the front foot and be positive.”