Speaking after yesterdays game, John Askey says he is pleased with how his team battled in a difficult match against Cambridge United to bounce back and pick up a “deserved” three points.
In their third home league game of the season, Vale hosted Colin Calderwood’s men in a challenging encounter which saw both sides work hard defensively to limit the opposition to very few attempts on goal.
As the second period progressed the Valiants were on the front foot but struggled to break through the firm backline, until David Amoo displayed his class, with a moment of magic as he burst through two defenders and fired the ball across the face of goal where it was put in by Richie Bennett.
An impressed Askey highlighted the grit, drive and determination of his players to keep fighting in a tough situation to make sure they claimed the points they deserved whilst also having a solid defensive display rewarded with a clean sheet.
The Valiants’ first clean sheet of the season was key for Askey who was pleased with how well the whole team worked together on stopping Cambridge attacks, with the visitors having only three attempts all game with none hitting the target.
He said: “Really pleasing defensively how we played, that’s not just the back four, that’s the whole team, we created one or two chances and I felt we deserved to win it.
“The last thing you want to do is lose and then lose again, if you cans stop that throughout the season, you don’t want one loss going into two then three, so we managed to do that and it’s important.
“I was really pleased with how the players responded, our fitness showed again, we had to be patient but a bit of magic’s won us the game.”
The teams response to the defeat at Grimsby was important to the gaffer, who pointed out how they made sure not to repeat their mistakes from last week by changing the tactics and set-up, which left the team exposed.
Instead the boss stuck with his team, and was rewarded for it, praising his side for their continued impressive home form, with the Valiants now picking up seven points from a possible nine at Vale Park this season.
The transformation of Vale Park into a fortress is key for Askey and he believes the performance and result will have boosted the players’ confidence going forward, with Tuesday’s Leasing.com Trophy group game against Shrewsbury Town now providing the first step on a possible cup run this season.
He said: “It is a balance, especially if you’re in control of the game, sometimes you’re better by being a little bit patient and that’s what we were today, we were patient and we got what we deserved in the end.
“Our home form is vital to us, the players are enjoying playing at home, you can see that and they’re giving everything they can, we’re trying to play the right way.
“The league’s the most important, but we’ll be wanting to win on Tuesday and you never know, you get a bit of a run and all of a sudden you can be in the quarter-finals or the semi-finals.”