Dons keeper happy with clean sheet and team’s display at Bristol Rovers

BY KAI BENNETT

AFC Wimbledon goalkeeper Nik Tzanev was pleased with his side’s performance and clean sheet at Bristol Rovers.

The Dons drew 0-0 at the Memorial Stadium on Saturday and extended their unbeaten run on the road to three matches.

“The boys grinded it out to the end,” said Tzanev. “There was a spell in the second half, about 20 minutes, where they put us under a bit of pressure but we dealt with it really well and had a couple of chances at the end, but Joe Day pulled off a couple of good saves.

“I trained with Joe last year, I was with him every day and got along with him really well. I congratulated him after the game.”

The New Zealand international has praised Wimbledon’s goalkeeper coach Ashley Bayes for helping him adjust to being back between the posts.

“Bayes has been massive for me – he’s always been on to me, in training he’s always kept me on my game and the two reserve games leading up to this were a real help, day in day out he’s always had me prepared so when the opportunity came around I was ready.”

Tzanev believes he has a really good connection with the backline.

“I’ve know [Will] Nightingale for four years now, I’ve been here a while so I’ve got a really good understanding with him and with DJ [Darnell Johnson] as well, I’m close with him and we’ve got a really good relationship going. I’m able to keep quite a high line, so those long balls that come over the top I can just sweep up and that takes the pressure off our defence.

“The more we play and the more we build as a team, the more confident we’ll get – you can see already that there’s a change in the football and that’s a credit to Robbo [Mark Robinson] for that.”