Mansfield Town

Top scorer Matt Green praised the influence of birthday boy Adi Yussuf after his appearance off the bench inspired the ten-man Stags to a 3-2 home win over Dagenham today.

Mansfield were 1-0 down, before Yussuf, 24 today, was introduced in the 51st-minute.

Then, Adam Murray’s side levelled two minutes later through Matty Blair and went on to score another two thanks to Yussuf and Green, although Jamie Cureton hit one back shortly after Krystian Pearce was sent off.

The second half display from the Stags' attacking duo was impressive, but Green was delighted that his Tanzanian partner could get in on the act with his fifth goal of the campaign.

“He (Yussuf) has got all the ability to kick on and achieve a lot at the club and I’m really happy for him on his birthday to get a goal and change the game for us.

“The most important thing is for us to win but I didn’t get many chances in the game which is something that I’ll have to work on. When they did [come], I’m glad I took one out of two.”

Despite triumphing this afternoon, ex-Birmingham City man Green, who bagged his 11th goal of the season today, believes improvements can still be made.

“The chairman’s got expectations of all of us, and the fans have more importantly than anyone so it’s a good three points but we need to go back and do a bit of work.

“I think we were quite fatigued against Plymouth but we can’t have any excuses at all. We need to be better. The main thing out of today was just to get the three points and we can crack on to the next game now.”

The Stags have played more league matches than anyone in the top half of the division and Green wants to focus on how Mansfield fare whilst continuing to get himself on the scoresheet.

“No matter what, they’ve got to win their games [the teams in and around the play-offs] and we’ve got to keep winning ours. As long as we keep winning ours then we should have success at the end of the season. As long as I keep knocking them in and we keep winning games, then fantastic.

“I never have a target, if there’s goals there to be scored I like to score them. I’ve been out for over a year so to come back, be scoring goals and be part of a team that looks like it’s going to be successful this season; so far, so good.”

Matt Green's interview can be viewed on Stags Player.