Skuse: More Licence for Me to Get Forward in New System Tuesday, 7th Mar 2017 06:00 Town fans were almost treated to a collector’s item towards the end of Saturday’s 1-1 home draw against Brentford — a rare goal from Cole Skuse. The midfielder, Kevin Bru and Kieffer Moore exchanged passes and Skuse looked a good bet to net only his second goal in 160 appearances since his arrival at Portman Road in July 2013. However, he failed to get the necessary power behind his low effort and Bees’ keeper Daniel Bentley had a comparatively easy task to gather the ball. But Skuse revealed: “I found myself in unknown territory and I was on a bit of a stretch. When I spoke to their goalie afterwards he said that if I’d got a bit more contact on the ball I’d have done him because he was a bit wrong-footed, so it was a bit unlucky I suppose.” However, Skuse’s lack of goals is nothing new and he added: “Throughout my career I’ve been saying that I wish I’d scored more goals. It’s not just my time at Ipswich, though, because I’ve only scored 10 career goals in nigh-on 500 appearances. “It’s not as if I’ve come to Ipswich as a prolific goalscorer because I didn’t score loads of goals at Bristol City either. “The job I do and the role I play here means I haven’t been able to get forward as much as maybe I’d have liked. But I really enjoy the position in which I play. “I won’t hang up my boots worried about the lack of goals and I won’t be telling my grandchildren in years to come how devastated I am that I didn’t score many. “Obviously, everyone wants to score goals but it’s not something I’ve done much of and the lads aren’t putting pressure on me to go out and score. “I’m asked to do various other jobs and we’ve got more than enough players in the team who are capable of getting us goals. “Switching to a 3-5-2 shape recently might mean I get more chances like the one against Brentford. The change has been good for us with some great performances. “There’s a bit more licence for me now but we’ve got lads in rich veins of form, as we’ve seen, and we’ll let them carry on doing what they’re doing. “Our recent run of six games without defeat means we’ve had a real good run of performances and the results maybe haven’t reflected the performances because we’ve had a few draws when we could have won the games. “But we’ve definitely steadied the ship and the lads are enjoying their football. We’re having a good little spell. “It would be good to turn the draws into wins but in that period of getting some decent performances we’ve played some very good teams, some of the top teams, so when I’m saying we should be turning draws into wins you can’t take anything away from the points we have gained. “We’ve come up against some really good sides so the points we have gained have been good points.” Meanwhile, Skuse and his colleagues are not losing too much sleep over the fact that Town are closer to the bottom of the Championship than the coveted play-off places. While they go into tonight’s home clash with struggling Wolves nine points above the safety level, they trail sixth-placed Sheffield Wednesday by twice as many. Skuse added: “I don’t know if I’m speaking on behalf of everyone but you look at both ends of the table. “It’s mad but when you are watching television, and they show the table, you see the top half and then they show the bottom half. "As it stands we’re sat in the bottom half so you are automatically looking at the teams you see on the screen. You know what’s happening around you. “But we’ve had enough good performances of late — and picked up several good points — to think that we’ll be OK. “Is it going to take big money to put together a team to challenge for promotion? That’s a hard one to answer because you see the teams at the top and they have obviously spent a lot of money. “But with our performances of late, with the personnel the gaffer has brought in, you can look at them through really positive eyes and think we could have a really good chance next season. “Obviously, I don’t know what’s going to happen with our loan players and whether they will go back to their parent clubs. “But we’ve more than held our own in this league for a fair few years now and we have a core of players who have been here for a little while. We’ve made steps in the right direction in all the time I’ve been here.” However, after a top-six finish two seasons ago and seventh last term Town have found it tougher this season and are currently sitting in 15th place. But Skuse said: “The season’s not finished yet and we still have a lot of games to play. We can still finish higher up the table. “Everyone is disappointed that we have not been around the play-offs for longer periods but that’s football and you have to take the rough with the smooth. It’s not everyone who goes to work every day and has a great day. It is what it is and you have to deal with it. “I’m still ambitious to play in the Premier League. I’m 30 years of age and you don’t play this game for ever. Your ambitions have to stay high if you want to play at as high a level as you can.”
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