Ethan Chislett picked up the sponsor’s man of the match award last night, but his focus remains very much on being a team player in our bid to retain League One status.
“We still believe,” said Ethan. “There’s still a huge amount of belief in the squad that we’re going to get ourselves out of this. We class it as a mini league we’re in now and every game is a cup final. You’ve got to wear your heart on your sleeve, and we’ve got to get victories now.
“The new management have been in similar situations before, and you can tell that they come with experience and a different outlook on things. Sometimes that’s needed. The fans got behind us tonight and to be honest, I think if there had been another five minutes added on – I think we’d have got the winner.”
Ethan came on with just over ten minutes of regulation time left and he made a vital contribution too, as he provided the assist for Zach Robinson’s equaliser and first league goal for the club.
“I got the ball from the corner, second phase,” said Ethan. “I put the cross in for Zach and he finished it very well. I’m disappointed that we’ve drawn the game, that overrides everything, but there are definitely positives to take and we’ll move on and get stronger.
“I think they’d been watching us, the way we want to play. We should have come out a bit more energetic in the first half, but in the second half we came out a lot better and that showed. Charlton scored kind of against the run of play, but we equalised through Zach."
“In the end, I think we made it a bit too difficult for ourselves," said Ethan "I think we need to put more crosses in the box, you saw what happened when we did towards the end of the game. It creates a lot of chances for us and uncertainty in the area. I feel we could have got a lot more out of the game.”
The Dons midfielder was relieved for his teammate George Marsh, who was the victim of a shocking challenge by Ryan Inniss. The Charlton substitute was immediately red carded for the offence.
“It was one of the worst challenges that I’ve ever seen,” said Ethan. “It came absolutely out of nowhere as well. Luckily, Marshy didn’t plant his foot because then I think it could have been really bad for him.
“Once they did get a man sent-off, we knew we’ve got to be potentially a bit more cute because naturally they are going to sit back, but then they counter-attacked and went a goal up and we made things difficult for ourselves. Having said that, there were positives for us to take into the next game and that’s what we’ll do.”
You can see the full interview with Ethan Chislett below, via the video link to our official YouTube channel.