“I’m very pleased,” the said.
“It’s a similar interview to the one I was doing against Colchester, where we go back to a home game next week and we’re all already looking forward to that.
“It’s important that we continue to try and improve and get better. That’s three wins in four and three clean sheets in four, including the Liverpool game in the Papa John’s Trophy. We need to make sure we’re solid and robust, and play with character, determination and desire, and that was all evident today. It was massive for us.
“Every credit to the players. We had a bit of an analysis meeting in the week with regards to what we weren’t pleased with against Doncaster Rovers last weekend, because I think we’re better than what we showed on the day. We’ve had a positive week with regards to training and preparation coming down, and we’ve come here today to play against a team that we [Nick Chadwick and I] thankfully got an opportunity to come and watch. We travelled down to Swindon on Tuesday to watch them [Newport] there and I think as a manager when you get the opportunity to get eyes on your opponent it’s important that you do that. And all the things they showed on that day and the game before against Leyton Orient where they won was exactly the same today.
“They’ve got threats with the likes of Omar Bogle and Will Evans up front. They are strong, determined, full of strength and full of running, and they have a certain way of playing. They ask questions, they put the ball in the box from long-throws and set plays, and I thought to a man we stood up to that and defended our box really, really well today in all aspects, so that’s pleasing.
“When called upon, the one mistake we did make in the first half, Rich O’Donnell got us out of it in terms smothering the ball when Bogle was through one-on-one. But other than that I didn’t see any clear cut chances, although that might look different when I watch it back.
“And we’ve created opportunities. One criticism again is that when we do go 1-0 up, we want two or three goals to turn their crowd and get that momentum. We had opportunities to do that, one from a well-worked corner routine where we had Toumani Diagouraga at the back post for a free header and then one on the counter-attack which we’ve got with the pace that we’ve got. Ibbi [Abraham Odoh] found Quigs [Scott Quigley] but he just couldn’t get it over the goalkeeper.
“We’ve given it our all and we’ve emptied the tank, which is the non-negotiables which should happen every game, and I think overall we probably deserved it. Going forward, we are showing good signs. If we can just pass that ball better and make better decisions in the mid-third or the final third, I think we’ll score more goals. But the position that we’re in, you build your foundations with being strong at the back. I think in the last three games before today we’ve only conceded five shots on target. We made a couple pf mistakes agains Doncaster where we could have been published but they didn’t hit the target, but that’s down to individual mistakes like we did today where Rich got us out of trouble. Very pleased with our rear guard action and going forward I think we will get better and hopefully we start scoring more goals and make it a little bit more comfortable than all hands to the pump at 1-0 up. So it’s really pleasing and hopefully it’s onwards and upwards.”
Watch the full interview on YouTube.
