Worcestershire skipper Daryl Mitchell insists promotion can still be achieved in the Specsavers County Championship and is targeting three wins in the last four games.
The County suffered a double setback in losing to Kent at Canterbury and Glamorgan at New Road and are 34 points behind leaders Essex.
But Worcestershire have still to visit Chelmsford and Mitchell is looking for his side to gain some momentum for the finale to the campaign starting with today's home encounter with Northamptonshire.
He said: "We are obviously in a bit of a sticky patch at the moment as we have had some poor results in the last few games.
"Losing the quarter final (in the Royal London One-Day Cup) to Somerset was obviously disappointing for the lads, but we have allowed ourselves a couple of days off to refresh and come into training hard.
"The morale in the camp is good and we are all looking forward to the Noirthants game.
"I still think we need three wins. We have made life a little bit more difficult for ourselves as we have got to win three out of four now.
"But promotion is still up for grabs as the division is very tight with everybody beating each other and if, we can put in some good performances and play well in the remaining games, then we are still in with a chance.
"We managed to get a couple of wins on the bounce in the early part of the year.
"We then went away from four day cricket and when we came back to it we struggled, so it is about getting that first win again and hopefully getting some momentum off the back of that."
Mitchell says the key to reversing their fortunes is for the County to produce better first innings displays after being dismissed cheaply against Kent and Glamorgan.
He said: "We were disappointing against Kent and then Glamorgan as we got bowled out for 160 and we were chasing the game from then on.
"We did bat very well in the second innings against Glamorgan, getting nearly 400, so we will be looking to bat better in this coming game.
"George (Rhodes) has come into the side and he has been playing well for the Seconds and he will hopefully give us a bit more solidarity in that middle order.
"As a group we have got to bat better in that first innings.
"Obviously we were stuck in against Glamorgan and overhead conditions were not in our favour with the toss rule, which worked against us there.
"But you have got to be better than that and see out that first session.
"Worcester is always a better place to bat in the afternoon, so we have got to be ready for what Northants throw at us and get through that tough period first thing in the morning."
Worcestershire triumphed over Northants by 310 runs in the fixture at Wantage Road last month.
Mitchell said: "Northants will be on a high from winning the Natwest T20 Blast at the weekend.
"They have played very well in white ball cricket but not so well in red ball, but we can take confidence in the way we played at Wantage Road.
"We are looking to start well, whether it be with bat or ball, and build pressure throughout the game and hopefully they will crack."
