Walsall FC: Dwayne Mattis calls for consistency if Saddlers are to make play-off push

Oct 29 2009 by Brian Halford, Birmingham Mail

DWAYNE Mattis is confident that Walsall have the armoury to win at Wycombe on Saturday – or anywhere else that League One sends them this season.

And the midfielder reckons the Saddlers also have the potential to put together a serious push for the play-offs – as long as they shed their Jekyll and Hyde tendencies.

Mattis and his team-mates will visit the bottom-of-the-table Chairboys fuelled by belief from having travelled to the likes of Norwich City and, last Saturday, Colchester United and created more than enough chances to win.

But also lurking in their locker is the type of embarrassing no-show which saw them trounced 3-0 at Hartlepool. As Mattis observes, it’s a question of which Walsall will turn up on the day.

“Apart from Charlton a lot of teams in the division are quite similar,” he said. “It is just a matter of who is the most consistent will be in the top six.

“We have a chance if we can just get a bit more consistency. If not we could be looking over our shoulder at the relegation area.

“We have drawn a lot of games and a few of those we should have won. We conceded in the last minute against Carlisle and there were other games that we should have closed out and if we had those extra points in the bag we would be in the top six now and sitting pretty.

“We have played well against some of the better sides in the division; Norwich, Leeds and MK Dons. We know we can compete against the top teams. It’s just a question of which Walsall turns up on the day.”

Top priority at Wycombe on Saturday, insists Mattis, is a clean sheet.

“We have players up front who can score goals,” he said. “Steve Jones is contributing from the wing and me and Mark Bradley are aiming to contribute a few more from midfield. We are scoring goals at the moment, it’s just a question of keeping more clean sheets because we will always score a goal.”