Manager Paul Cox has urged his team to maintain their fine form for the remainder of the season, following this afternoon’s vital 1-0 victory at Morecambe.
Junior Daniel’s magnificent free-kick on 42 minutes proved to be the deceive winner, as Stags picked up their third win in a row, climbing into the top half of Sky Bet League Two and 10 points above the relegation zone.
Our manager believes his side still have a lot more to improve on, but was proud of his players after this afternoon’s crucial win at the Globe Arena.
“Until it is mathematically safe, we're going to keep on going,” said Cox. “We've seen a couple of results today which have and haven’t gone against us.
“I’m going to drive these boys on and we are going to finish this season well, because that is what we are paid to do.
“We've got Rochdale next week which is a big game again, but we've put a run of good results together now, so we will give the boys a few days off to recharge again."
He continued: “I thought we lacked a bit of quality at times, but we can look at the season as a whole, looking at what we've done well and what we've done badly.
“I want us to improve and get better and there’s an awful lot more we can get better at. The players are running through a brick wall like they’ve done again today and you can’t fault them.”
Reflecting more on today's game, our manager admitted it was a feisty encounter, highlighted by the fact that the home side went down to 10 men on 82 minutes, following Andrew Fleming’s red card for a late tackle on Adam Murray.
Cox continued: “I think we knew what was coming our way. We knew Morecambe were going to come out and both sides really went for each other.
“There were tackles, there were incidences and there was everything you can really think about in a football match. I’m just happy we got the 1-0 win because today was a right battle.
“I thought the sending off was correct and the referee got it right. There were a lot of incidences that were off the ball which maybe should have been pulled up, but that was pretty even on both sides.”
Meanwhile, Cox revealed the extent of Lee Beevers’ shoulder injury, as the defender was brought off after four minutes, being replaced by goal scorer Daniel.
He added: “It was a dislocated shoulder. It came out of his socket again, so we had to bring him off as quickly as possible.
“He is fine now as it has popped back in. It’s an ongoing problem which he will be having an operation on at some point.”
