Mat Sadler issues Walsall rallying call
Mat Sadler insists Walsall will "keep on fighting" after they missed a golden opportunity to close the gap in the League Two play-off race following a 2-1 defeat at Doncaster Rovers.
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Joe Ironside opened the scoring six minutes before half-time with a close-range tap-in from Luke Molyneux's cutback, before Hakeeb Adelakun added a second in the 77th minute with a looping header.
Isaac Hutchinson halved the deficit with a free-kick in second half stoppage time, but Walsall were unable to make up ground on the top seven, after seventh-place Crawley Town lost 4-1 at Wrexham.
The Saddlers, who trail the play-off spots by three points, face three home games in the space of a week against Notts County, Swindon Town and Bradford City respectively, and Sadler is confident his team will keep on going until the very end.
"We know this group respond and keep coming back," the Walsall boss said. "They keep going again and we probably just didn't quite get into our rhythm in the second half as much as we would've wanted to.
"Sometimes that happens when you change things around but we also have some tired bodies. Flash (Josh Gordon) was shattered, he worked his socks off.
"Then you're trying to get a few attacking players onto the pitch as we did. It's clear at this stage of the season that we want to win games but the group keep fighting.
"It wasn't to be tonight and we'll reflect on that. We'll also look at how we want to defend those long straight balls a bit better in the future, but credit to Doncaster because they've got players who want to run in behind and pose those challenges to you."
Sadler revealed that Jackson Smith missed the match due to illness, as Owen Evans was recalled for his first start in two months. Jamille Matt was also replaced at the break and continues to nurse his way through what Sadler described last week as a "neural issue".
"Jacko was not very well. It was a late one but I've always said that I'm lucky to have Owen (Evans) to come in," he revealed.
"Considering how late the call was, I thought he did very well. We're nursing Jamille through something at the minute. You saw that in the previous games against Salford and Tranmere.
"We're trying to get him through because we know how important he is to us. He's giving everything he can to be out there but he's nursing his way through and it just became a bit too much."
