RICKY Gabriel has total faith that Braintree Town can get themselves clear of their current predicament in the Vanarama National League relegation zone.

The Iron full-back knows the team have had shortcomings at both ends of the pitch in recent games as a five-match winless run has left them rock bottom in the table and seven points away from the safety zone.

However, he insists that the players fully believe that they can rectify what has been going wrong and knows the talent exists within the squad to get themselves clear under manager Hakan Hayrettin.

“We have to turn it around and I believe that it’s coming – 100 per cent," said Gabriel.

“There are certain things that have cost us recently, but I honestly believe we’ll be alright and we’ll be safe come the end of the season.

“I see that in every player in the dressing room.

“We don’t just have belief, we have the talent we need.

“Putting those together and with hard work, I know we’ll get ourselves out of this.

“It’s just going to take more consistency from us.

“We played well against Sutton but were pegged back at the end and we just need more consistency to see games out.

“That and taking chances up front, but I really do see that it will happen.

“When we have chances, they just have to be taken, and when we are defending, we have to be ruthless and make sure we are on it."

The Iron will travel to Havant & Waterlooville in the league on Saturday looking to not only get back to winning ways but to also avenge a defeat they suffered at home in August when a 3-2 lead was overturned in time added-on at the end of the match and Braintree ended as 4-3 losers.

Gabriel added: “We honestly do have enough in the team to get ourselves out of this mess.

“That starts again on Saturday at Havant and Waterlooville.

“I didn’t play in the first game against them as I was watching in the stands, but we do owe them one after how that ended.

“We’ll look to get a result and keep building from there.”

The 27-year-old was the only member of Braintree's starting line-up for their 2-0 league defeat by Barrow last weekend to start in their 2-0 Essex Senior Cup defeat at Chelmsford City in midweek.

The Iron took the opportunity to have a look at a number of trial players and promising youngsters from the reserves.

Gabriel said: “I don’t think you could read too much into the result with all the changes we made.

“The Gaffer wanted to see a few players and he just said to try and get a result with the 11 that we had.

“Obviously we couldn’t do that, but it was one of those where the changes showed.

“The new boys coming in may not have been fully up with how we try to press and we perhaps allowed Chelmsford too much of the ball.

“So they were able to do what they needed to do.

“It didn’t really work for in terms of a result but you can’t really judge it too much."