STUART Nelson is certain Notts County can revive their faltering season and has pleaded with fans to keep the faith.

After rising as high as third place in League One this campaign, the Magpies slipped all the way down to 15th after just one win in 14 league games.

But they won 1-0 at Walsall on Tuesday night to halt the slide and goalkeeper Nelson said: "We have deserved better results in a lot of games. We've lost games we should have won.

"The results have been hard to take because of the way we've been playing, but none of us are feeling sorry for ourselves.

"We're still positive because we know we're not far away from getting it right.

"I will say it as many times as I have to. People have to stick with us because we are a good team and we're doing things the right way.

"We've been so close to winning in a lot of the games. Not one team has battered us, our goal-difference shows that. We're the only team in the bottom-half to have a positive goal-difference. Some of the teams towards the top don't even have that.

"We've had key players injured at vital times and that makes a big difference because we have not got a big squad. We're playing off a squad of 18 or 19, but we've still come so close so many times."

The Magpies have a good home league record this season, having won six and lost only two of 13 games at Meadow Lane.

They have also drawn their last three games on home soil to Huddersfield, MK Dons and Preston, ahead of facing Stevenage, who they lost 1-0 to in the fourth round of the FA Cup, at Meadow Lane on Saturday.

Nelson believes those three draws give Notts a platform to build on.

"We were knocking on the door all the game against Preston, but sometimes you don't score," he said.

"I think the positives from the game were that it is another one unbeaten and we kept a clean-sheet, which we haven't done many times this season, so that's important."