John Askey believes his team have no reason to fear any opposition after they secured their first back to back league away wins in over two years, beating rivals Crewe Alexandra 1-0.
Vale picked up their third successive win over Crewe yesterday in front of over 2,300 travelling Valiants and the gaffer was delighted to reward their excellent support with a good performance and three points.
The win sees the Vale climb to 10th and just two points off the Play-Offs, and the boss admitted he was pleased with how his team played, having the better chances against a side who were top of the table.
Two away wins on the bounce, against the top two sides in the league in Bradford and Crewe, have added to the confidence amongst the squad as Askey sees no reason his team cannot take on any side they face.
He said: “Really pleased obviously, we needed it, puts us back into a decent position, but obviously when you have a travelling support like we had today then we’re desperate to get them a result and I’m really pleased to say we have.
“I thought we set out well, we stopped them from playing, worked really hard and had a little bit of fortune in the goal but I thought we had the better of the chances… as I say, in a derby game you aren’t bothered how you win as long as you win.
“I think we’ve been playing well away from home, we’ve had a couple of blips, but apart from that we’ve done really well away from home and were unfortunate to not get three points before the Bradford game.
“We said that [there’s no reason to fear anyone] before the game anyway, that all the teams that we’ve played there’s nobody who’s taken us apart… we know that if we can work hard and keep trying to do the right things we’ll get results.”
Jake Taylor once again found his name on the scoresheet, and the gaffer praised him, along with midfield partners Scott Burgess and Luke Joyce, for how hard they worked yesterday.
It wasn’t just the attack that pleased the boss though, with the performances of Leon Legge and Nathan Smith in earning another clean sheet for the Vale also receiving his plaudits.
Adding more clean sheets has been an aim this season and after picking up two in a row, Askey expressed how happy he is with the continued development in both the attack and defence.
He said: “He [Taylor] gets into the box, he’s got lots of energy, but not only does he get into the box, he works back as well and him and Scott [Burgess] have covered a hell of a lot of ground today with Joycey and you need that if you’re going to win games .
“They’ve [Legge and Smith] done really well again, getting that partnership and playing week in week out, and because they are both good players at this level, it can only help them and we’re starting to keep clean sheets now.
“It’s the most important thing keeping your clean sheets, if you’re not keeping clean sheets then there’s things wrong and then you’re relying on scoring a lot of goals… hopefully that [discipline] can develop but also we can get back to scoring a few more goals.”