Jake Vokins open to staying at Ross County after current loan from Southampton expires with European football in left back's sights
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Jake Vokins has not ruled out a return to Ross County next season.
The on-loan Southampton full back has spent the season with the Staggies, making 19 appearances in all competitions this season after missing the first four months of the campaign through injury.
It has been a successful spell in Dingwall, helping the club into the Premiership's top six for the first time since 2016 and on the brink of European football for the first time ever.
So positively does Vokins view his time at the club, then, that he has not ruled out a return for the 2022/23 campaign.
“I haven’t settled anything, not as yet," Vokins, whose Southampton contract runs until the summer of 2024, said.
“I still have four games I want to concentrate on, but I’ll have a meeting at the end of the season with Ross County and we’ll go from there.
“Coming back here is definitely an option. I like it up here. I love the fans, the players, the staff.
“If we do qualify for Europe, it will be an extra attraction, but there’s lots to focus on before then in the next four games as we try to cement that European place.”
For the Staggies to qualify for next season's Europa Conference League, they will need to finish at least fifth in the table.
Motherwell are currently trying to catch County and Dundee United, but all three sides are close in the standings with the Steelmen playing United today.
County, meanwhile, are off to Edinburgh to face Hearts at Tynecastle, a match Vokins is looking forward to.
“In the three games we’ve played against Hearts, we’ve shown we can compete against them," the 22-year-old reasoned.
"We’ve put up a fight and we feel we can definitely beat them.
“Having played them three times already, we can analyse what we did against them and what they did against us, and put it to good use in our efforts to beat them.
“We know where we can hurt them and they can hurt us. They’re going to analyse us as well and they’ll know how we play, but if we play to our best we can definitely get a win.
”Last time I went there, it was a weekend when there were no fans allowed in, but our travelling fans support us all the way and we can’t wait to play there.
“We know as a team we have got into the top six on our performances, completely on merit and earned the right to play at these grounds at the end of the season, but we’re not content with that, we want to push further.
“We’ve still got four very important games and we’re going to go into each and every pone of them playing to win.
“A win at Tynecastle would definitely lift our hopes that we can push up the table even more and try to secure that European place.
“Everyone in the changing room is determined to keep pushing for that space and to get as high in the table as possible, especially given we know that we can get results against the teams involved."
