CLEAN sheets won’t win Swindon Town promotion to the Championship, and goalkeeper Wes Foderingham is more concerned with defensive displays than shutouts as the Robins aim for a top-six finish.

Foderingham, who kept 24 clean sheets as Town won the League Two title last term, has managed 10 so far this season – in 27 appearances – to help Swindon to eighth in the table.

However, the former Crystal Palace stopper has stressed that he understands keeping the number of goals conceded down over the course of the season is more important than not letting one in on any single occasion.

When asked whether performances or clean sheets matter more, he said: “Probably the performance. It’s been a few games without a clean sheet but we’ve not felt more comfortable all season.

“Last year was really good with clean sheets and our defensive unit was sound all season but we’ve gone up a level now, the teams are different, there are a lot better players and it’s a lot more difficult to keep clean sheets and keep the goals down as well.

“If you look at the goals conceded, we’ve not conceded that many in terms of where we are in the league so I think the confidence is high and we’ll do really well with that.

“At the end of the season, if you look at the table, you don’t get high off keeping more clean sheets, it’s the goals that are going to count and the goals against and if we can keep that down that might be the difference between us getting in the play-offs and not getting in the play-offs or getting in the top two or not getting in the top two.

“If we can get the goals and keep the goals conceded down we’ll shoot up the table.”

Town’s back four has had a different look to it on a frequent basis in 2012/13, but Foderingham claimed the Robins’ defence has not been negatively affected by the enforced chopping and changing.

“It can be difficult but the changes have probably not come in personnel so much as maybe from Joe playing at centre-back and going to right-back then left-back and the same for Macca,” he said.

“It’s pretty much the same sort of players and they’re just changing positions. We work in training on defensive line nearly every day so the players are familiar with themselves now.”