Tisdale aware his job is at stake at MK Dons

With six defeats and a draw from their last seven in League One, Dons find themselves sat 19th in the table, just a point above the drop zone after 14 games.

Both Karl Robinson and Robbie Neilson were given the boot by chairman Pete Winkelman when they dropped into the League One relegation zone, and Tisdale is well aware of the fragility of his position at the club should Dons drop into the bottom three on Saturday.

"I'm a professional person and I'm professionally concerned about where we are," he said. "I know how this business works, so we need some results. It's a tough period for us, whatever the reasons. I'm concerned like everyone else.

"We're in the middle of a really terrible run of results. It's no-one's fault really, and we're fully enthused to get a result soon. We need to, I'm not stupid, we need a result.

"When things aren't going right, there are 100 ideas but you only really need one or two, but you have to find the one or two that make the biggest difference to make it work.

"I know, from experience, that that step is so small and it can happen so quickly. When it feels bleak and you feel it isn't going to change, it will and I believe the players want that to happen. We get upset and frustrated when it doesn't happen, but the players are trying hard. We just have to keep going trying to find the right way."

A trip to high-flying Fleetwood Town on Saturday is not the easiest of trips for Tisdale's side to make, both in terms of distance and in terms of the calibre of opposition to face, but the Dons boss says given their awful run, he cannot afford to concentrate on what Fleetwood are doing, instead making sure his own house is in order.

He continued: "We can only consider ourselves and making our lives easier for ourselves. The players have to play a part in this, it's not just me having the ideas. They have to realise the importance of this to themselves and the club. I have to give them the right directions and then they have to go out and do it.

"When you're on a run like this, you're on a knife edge all the time. Any game where it doesn't work, it becomes magnified.