Liam Rosenior has stressed the importance of Derby County bouncing back from their loss against Charlton Athletic at the weekend as quickly as possible.
Derby went down 3-0 at The Valley as they returned to action following the second international break of the campaign.
The defeat in the capital inflicted a first defeat in five games on Phillip Cocu’s side in the Sky Bet Championship.
The Rams’ boss was particularly disappointed in his side’s performance and admitted after the final whistle that they never got going against the Addicks.
Rosenior, who joined Cocu’s staff in the summer in the position of Specialist First Team Coach, has highlighted the need to show an immediate response.
Derby have a chance to get the loss out of their system quickly, as they take on Wigan Athletic at Pride Park Stadium on Wednesday night (7:45pm kick-off).
Their unbeaten run, which included two wins and three draws, came off the back of a 3-0 reverse at Brentford at the end of August.
Rosenior says it’s key for the Rams to show a similar sort of reaction when they take to the field on Wednesday.
Speaking to RamsTV, Rosenior said: “This league is not about how many games you lose, you can lose 12, 13 or even 14 games and still get into the play-offs.
“You need to win games and it is really important that you respond to disappointment.
“Whether you miss a chance, or you concede a goal, you have to respond to it. If you lose a game, you make sure you win the next one.
“You can’t keep looking back and being disappointed, we need to look forward.
“There has been a lot of good things in the last few games that we need to take against Wigan, who are a very strong team. If we do that, we have a very good chance of winning the game.”
He added: “The last time we had a poor performance and lost the game, at Brentford at the end of August, we went on a five-game unbeaten run. That’s what this league is all about.
“You look at the league, we have lost three games out of 12, the team at the top has lost three games out of 12. As much as you want to get emotional and upset, we analyse, move forward and we improve. If we do that, then we are still in for a really good season.”
Reflecting on the defeat at Charlton, Rosenior echoed the comments of Cocu.
He admitted the manner of the loss was particularly frustrating and felt the Rams didn’t make life easy for themselves against Lee Bowyer’s side.
An early goal had them on the back foot, while conceding just after the break gave Derby a mountain to climb.
He said: “I think you are always disappointed when you lose a game of football, that will never change.
“There are ways to lose football matches and I think there’s the manner of the defeat.
“When you go away from home the most important thing is you don’t concede early. We conceded after six minutes on Saturday and then we get back into the game; we consolidated towards the end of the first half without really creating too many clear-cut chances.
“We were in a position at half-time where we were quite confident, we just needed to apply a few things tactically at half-time.
“The frustrating thing from my point of view, as a coach, is when you concede from a set play straight after half time and then you are 2-0 down.
“All of a sudden you start chasing the game and things unravel. What I would say is that Charlton had a very good performance from them, they took their chances and scored a fantastic third goal.”
Rosenior’s position on the first-team staff, as well as working with players on the training ground with a particular emphasis on individual development of emerging young talent, sees him play a prominent role in pre-match opposition analysis with the scouting and analysis departments.
He says it’s vital that the Rams learn from their mistakes as they look to move forward, both in the short and long-term.
“Our job, amongst all the emotion, it is easy to get angry and point fingers after a game, but we need to analyse and think how we can improve,” he explained.
“That is why I am here, so we improve not just over a week or two weeks, but over a year or two years to get us to where we want to be.
“The most important thing now is that we learn from our mistakes. We learn from the fact that we can’t go away from home and give a team a one goal lead, you can’t come out after half time and give a poor goal from a set play away.
“You look at the games we have been in and we have been the better team in a lot of games this season and we have got a real chance against Wigan to put things right.”