NATHAN Byrne has praised the team spirit in the Swindon Town camp by branding the current squad “the tightest group” of players he’s played with over the course of his career.

Byrne, recently back from a hamstring injury, paid tribute to the atmosphere generated by a young dressing room at the County Ground.

Having spent spells out on loan at Bournemouth, Crawley Town and Brentford during his time with Tottenham, the 21-year-old has experienced being a part of several different set-ups - but he feels Swindon’s tops the lot.

“I think throughout the season the lads have been a good unit. It’s been the tightest group of boys I’ve ever played with,” he said.

“There is a lot of youth. Even with some of the older lads, they still have a laugh and a joke. It’s about not being too serious all the time. There’s always banter flying around the dressing room and that helps because we’re all young lads, we’re all willing to learn and we all want to improve - individually and as a team.

“I think it helps that there are a lot of us around the same age. It’s usually a big mixture but there are only a few lads here who are over 24, which is very rare in league football. I think it’s a really good thing.

“It’s hard, if you play a young versus old game, to pick the teams. You’ve got lads in the old team who are 22, which you don’t get at other clubs. It’s a great bunch of lads here and I think we’re thriving off the fact we’re such a strong unit.”

Byrne and Town travel to Carlisle United tomorrow looking for the victory which will keep them in the hunt for a League One play-off place. And the full-back insisted confidence is high going into the fixture.

“The lads are confident,” he said. “I think we’ve shown that we can battle through games. Some of the game haven’t been the easiest and we haven’t been on top through the whole game but the lads know we can battle and we can win ugly.

“We saw in the last game against Sheffield United that we’ve got a bit more in the squad and we’ve got players who want to come off the bench and make an impact. There’s a lot of confidence in the dressing room but we’re not getting carried away.

“We know it’s in Peterborough’s hands to lose but if we can put pressure on them in the next six games then that’s what we’re going to try to do.”