JOEL Latibeaudiere felt Coventry City did not take enough ‘risks’ with the ball following a goalless draw against Oxford United.
The centre-back made just his fifth league start of the season against the U’s and helped the Sky Blues record a first clean sheet since Boxing Day.
The result leaves Coventry one point clear at the top of the table although second-placed Middlesbrough have a game in-hand.
However, despite allowing a 10-point lead at the top of the table to slip, Latibeaudiere insists the Sky Blues are not feeling any anxiety or nerves in their quest to achieve promotion.
Latibeaudiere said: “It’s always frustrating when a game like that happens. You put so much pressure on the opposition and the ball won’t drop for you.
“You have to take the positives away from it. The positive we can take is a clean sheet. We created chances, we just couldn’t put it to bed.
“That’s for us to go and look at and focus on getting better and better, especially as this time of the season.
“We want to be winning, winning and winning. We’ll go back, look at the game and move on.
“I wouldn’t say there’s anxiety or nervousness in the group. We’ve gone through a patch where the results haven’t been as good as at the start of the season.
“We started the season flying and took off, it’s settled out a bit and it’s just about digging through these rough patches and sticking together.”
Chances were at a premium throughout as Oxford failed to register a single shot on target while Coventry managed just five efforts on target from 24 attempts on goal.
And Latibeaudiere felt the Sky Blues did not take enough risks when in possession but acknowledged Oxford’s resolute defensive display.
Latibeaudiere added: “Something I think we could have done better is risk the ball.
“Just keep putting it in to those danger areas and when it drops being around those ricochets and that’s how you get your goal.
“For me, we didn’t risk the ball enough. It isn’t always as easy as you think when a team goes down to 10-men.
“Especially a team like Oxford who are fighting to stay in the league. They’ve got a lot of tough players and they defended well in the end.”
Coventry are next in action against Middlesbrough on Monday, Februray 16 with kick-off at 8pm at the CBS Arena.
