Gareth McAuley believes Ipswich Town’s trip to Plymouth is like a “cup final”.

Both sides have made a dreadful start to the season and occupy the bottom two places in the table.

Town are in the basement spot and still without a win in 13 Championship games.

However, they would have leap-frogged tomorrow’s hosts had they held on and beat Watford in Tuesday’s 1-1 draw at Portman Road.

Looking ahead to the long trek west, McAuley said: “It’s bound to be tough but we’re growing in confidence.

“Plymouth will put us under pressure and in many ways it’s like a cup final.

“Even at this early stage in the season season it’s massive.

“Every game is massive for us given the situation we’re in.

“But we’re making progress and are much more solid as a team, with more cohesion than earlier in the season.

“We’ve all got to stick together and we’re in this as one.

“The manager has definitely got it in him to get the club where they want to be and he keeps driving us on.

“We’re slowly moving in the right direction and we all want a quick fix. Hopefully that’ll come at Plymouth.”

McAuley definitely wants to avoid the “gut-wrenching” disappointment of conceding another late goal.

In addition to Tuesday’s hammer-blow against Watford, Town have also shipped costly goals at the likes of Doncaster, Sheffield United and Barnsley.

“It you take the worst thing that’s ever happened to you and multiply it you get close to how awful we felt,” said defender McAuley, referring to the Hornets setback.

“I really had no words to describe it. It was gut-wrenching.

“It affects everybody, including your family, and it’s a situation none of the players have been in before. Nobody has had a winless run like this.

“But late goals keep happening and we must learn to concentrate right to the final whistle.”

Former skipper McAuley could regain the captaincy at Home Park, if Jon Walters fails to recover from an injury picked up on Tuesday.

Plymouth have only won two games this season, at home to Scunthorpe and away to Peterborough.

They lost 3-1 at Bristol City on Tuesday, after conceding three goals in six minutes.