If Saturday was an afternoon of frustration for Exeter City, as they went down to a 1-0 home defeat to League Two promotion rivals Bury, there were at least some positives to take from the game.
The performance of West Brom youngster Dara O’Shea at the back again drew widespread praise as the 19-year-old looks increasingly comfortable at this level following a series of dominant displays.
And a lively cameo from fellow loanee Donovan Wilson was also a plus point for City, even if the on-loan Wolverhampton Wanderers striker could not get the elusive equalising goal that the Grecians craved.
“It was good to get my first game for Exeter, but a shame about the result. I was happy to come on and get a taste of it and hopefully we bounce back next week and get the win,” Wilson told DevonLive.
“As a striker, I always want shots. I always want to try and score goals and I need to keep shooting. It’s annoying that they didn’t go in because that would have been a nice debut, to have scored the equaliser, but hopefully, next week, I can make up for it.”
The Grecians head to Crewe Alexandra on Saturday for the first of three games in a week. They also travel to Lincoln City before hosting Tranmere Rovers at St James Park.
Defeat to Bury was a blow to their hopes of automatic promotion, but while it was disappointing to lose, City have plenty of matches in which to get the points they need for promotion.
“We wanted to get the win, of course, but we know we are still good enough. We need to try and get a few wins on the bounce and then we can climb right back up there,” Wilson added
“We have got Crewe next. We want to get promoted, so hopefully we can win a couple of games in a row and get right back up there.
“We aren’t going to get down over it and 100 per-cent we can bounce back from it. Every game is massive and it is not over yet. We still have 13 games left, so there is a long way to go.
“We have a lot of the teams around us to play and they are the games where we have to try and pick up as many points as possible. The more we pick up against them, the more they will drop, so we definitely need to pick up as many as we can against them.”
Wilson was making his first appearance for the Grecians since arriving on deadline day. His move to Exeter came after a goal-laden spell in Spain, where he spent the first half of the season on loan at Wolves’ feeder club, Jamilla.
But this is a step up in standard and while he hasn’t had as much game time as he may have had, Bristol-born Wilson is enjoying his time back in the Westcountry.
“I’ve really enjoyed my time here so far and I really like Exeter as well,” he said. “They try and pass the ball a lot, which suits my style of play as well, which is good. There are a lot of different styles in League Two, but I like the way Exeter play and it suits me well.
“I was at Bristol Rovers before I went to Wolves, so I played against Exeter a lot in my younger years. They’ve always been the same. It’s the way they’ve been brought up.
“I went out to Spain for the first half of the season and it was much different to what I am used to, but it was good to get the experience over there. Now I am back in England and hopefully I can kick on here and help Exeter do well.
“I scored a few goals while I was out there and it was nice to get amongst the goals. As a striker, you always want to be scoring goals, that’s your main thing and it helps the team win games, so it was nice to get a few out there. Hopefully I can get a few here and kick on.
“As soon as I heard about the interest, I was dying to go. I found out about the interest and within six hours, I was on my way down here, so it’s all good. It’s only about 80 miles from Bristol, so it’s really close.”
