John Welsh has urged Tranmere to avoid a repeat of last season's nervy finish beginning at Oldham.
Tranmere captain wants to ease relegation nerves
John Welsh has urged Tranmere to avoid a repeat of last season's nervy finish beginning with Monday's trip to Oldham.
Rovers are two points above the League One relegation zone with 10 games left and are preparing for a crucial televised clash at Boundary Park.
Victory would take Tranmere a point behind Oldham with a game in hand and raise hope of securing survival in good time.
Last term Rovers won their last two games to escape the drop and captain Welsh is eager to prevent it going down to the wire again.
Clawing away
"If we win we'll be just behind Oldham, which would be great," he told
skysports.com.
"I think we just need to keep clawing away, keep picking up points and move as far up the table as possible because we don't want to be going into the last couple of games getting dragged back into it, like we did last season.
"That did my nerves no good and I'd rather we can relax the last game of the season than worry about going down.
"The sooner we reach the magic 50, as they call it, the better really."
Tranmere are eight points off that 50-point mark after last week's 1- 0 home victory against Colchester, which halted a run of seven games without a win.
Rovers took just two points from a possible 21 during that spell but they now have the opportunity to launch a late-season rally.
Big result
"We knew against Colchester that it was a must-win game," said Welsh.
"We went into the game on the back of two straight losses and it was a home game so we really needed to pick up three points.
"It was a big result for us and hopefully we can get a run going and get back-to-back wins, which is massive in this league."
Oldham have shown how quickly things can change in League One as a run of 11 games without a win has seen them plummet from promotion contention to potentially facing a relegation battle.
The Latics will be desperate to stop the rot against one of their North West rivals but Rovers have thumped Walsall and Plymouth on the road this season.
"It's going to be a tough game," Welsh added. "Oldham's always a tough place to go and a lot of people see it as a local derby.
"But I do think a lot of our good performances have been away from home so we'll be going into the game quite confident.
"We've had a good result against Colchester so we'll be hopeful of getting another three points."
