"We Will Keep Our Heads Up And Keep Fighting"

Martyn Waghorn is urging everyone in the Derby County camp to stick together and keep believing through a 'difficult patch' following a 1-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest.

The forward is confident the Rams will quickly get back on track and push up the Sky Bet Championship table following back-to-back losses, by a single goal, in recent games against Millwall and Forest.

The Rams sit just two points outside the play-off spots in seventh place and Waghorn feels that if the team can get back to playing their best in their upcoming fixtures coming up then they will give themselves every chance of returning to winning ways.

Speaking to RamsTV he said: “At the minute it’s not quite going for us, this is where we need to stick together as a team because we have got a great group of lads in there and we know what we are capable of.

“It is a difficult patch we are going through but we have got full confidence in each other, we know how we want to play and we have got to keep believing in ourselves. We have got good fixtures coming up that we can take points from.”

He added: “We have all seen this league in the past. You put a run together and win two or three games on the bounce and you propel yourselves back up there.

“We will get in tomorrow, work hard and get ready for the weekend and the trip to Aston Villa.”

Waghorn came the closest to providing the equaliser for the Rams in the opening 15 minutes to cancel out Forest’s goal in the second minute through Yohan Benalouane.

After being played through by Duane Holmes, Waghorn went one-on-one with Costel Pantilimon but was disappointed to fire his effort wide.

“We are very disappointed. In a game like this you want to see out the first 10-15 minutes, keep it tight and unfortunately, we conceded a very sloppy goal in the first set-piece,” Waghorn said.

“We knew they were going to be big on that and we didn’t defend it well at all. Ultimately it cost us.

“It allowed them to sit in. I had them in the first-half with a big chance, but I need to do better. As a striker I’ve got to score that.

“I saw him come out quite quick, so I thought if I take it quickly I could catch him off guard. In hindsight you’d do something different but that’s the decision I took and I have got to score that in a game like this.”

The Rams have a chance on Saturday to bounce back against Aston Villa at Villa Park before four consecutive games at Pride Park Stadium, with the international break coming after the third.

Waghorn says the team needs to use the upcoming fixtures to build momentum into the business end of the season.

He said: “We need to use those home games. The fans were fantastic today, full voice and really kept going and driving us on to the end we are going to need them at home for some big fixtures.

“We have got to do our part now on the pitch. We will keep our heads up and keep fighting.”