Sam Ricketts tells Shrewsbury Town not to take AFC Wimbledon lightly

Town have hit a bit of form under Ricketts having gone unbeaten in four league games with two draws and two defeats.

Four matches unbeaten is their best run of a difficult league campaign. Shrewsbury are looking for three straight league wins for the first time this term against Wally Downes’ strugglers.

But, after beating seventh-placed Peterborough and sixth-placed Doncaster, Ricketts does not expect his players to take their foot off the gas for the visit of the basement boys, who he believes have improved in recent weeks.

“It’s a hard game. It doesn’t matter if you’re playing Wimbledon or Doncaster, they’re still very, very tough games,” said Town chief Ricketts.

“We have to raise our game, we have to improve in every game regardless of who we’re playing. I want to get better than we were the game before.

“It’s alright seeing good signs in the last couple of games, it’s no good if we don’t show that in the upcoming games.”

Ricketts revealed he felt improving AFC Wimbledon are in much better form than their lowly league position suggests.

When asked how he guards against complacency, Ricketts responded: “You can do everything you can do.

“The big thing for it is competition for places, if you want to be playing in the team then you have to perform well. If not you’ve got someone who is performing very well ready to play as well.

“That should hopefully kill an awful lot of complacency, and also knowing that we’re driving standards. It isn’t a pat on the back, it’s a ‘well done, but this is where we need to improve and get better.”

Town are aiming for back-to-back league clean sheets for the first time since early October.

Midfield general Anthony Grant is suspended for two games but Town welcome back Ollie Norburn and Dave Edwards from bans.

The boss added: “The players had confidence in seeing what they can do and the reasons why we ask them to do certain things.

“I think it re-assures the fans that we are going in the right direction, we are improving slowly but surely and given training time the team can improve.”