City manager hails value of victory in Accrington
Exeter City manager Paul Tisdale lauded the value and importance of a 3-2 victory away to Accrington Stanley.
As well as being another three points accumulated towards the Grecians’ ambitions for the season, it also provided a psychological boost on a number of levels.
Exeter dug deep to survive the resolute Stanley fight-back – the hosts were quickly three goals behind but made a fist of it with fine headed goals either side of half-time.
It also ends the winless Grecians’ long winless run – dating back to a 4-0 victory at Scunthorpe – and now with three games unbeaten, the team can begin looking back up the table again as the momentum starts to shift back into City’s favour.
“We didn’t make it easy, but I would have been surprised had it become easy,” Tis said of the win against Accrington. “Even with three goals, whatever you do find when you play here is that they can really turn the heat up and they did that today.
“It was a terrific game and I’m so pleased we’ve won it because we’ve not won a game for a while. It was a big win.
“We had a rotten November – we’ve had two draws and needed a win so it gets us going again. We’re capable of winning games but we haven’t been doing it recently, so it was a really big win.
“To have been three up and to have drawn three-all would have taken the stuffing out of us. So the win was more valuable than just three points today.”
Two Tom Nichols goals and an Alan Gow strike had set City cruising, before a glanced Peter Murphy header cut the lead a little before the referee blew up for the half-time break.
And in the scheme of things, it possibly aided the City manager by reinforcing the message that he wanted to send to his players in the dressing room during the interval.
“[The goal] made the team-talk at half-time adjust slightly,” he continued. “I would still have been making sure the players were on their mettle, because one goal can become two or three very quickly.
“I think it made the players believe me a bit more. Had it been three-nil at half-time, it might have gone in one ear and out the other. I think it made the players listen a bit closer.”
The game also saw the spine of the side made from homegrown players – no less than five of the starters came out of the Academy at the Cat & Fiddle.
Tom Nichols led the line in his first start of the year, Liam Sercombe and Matt Grimes manned the midfield and the centre-half partnership was made from Jordan Moore-Taylor and captain for the afternoon Scot Bennett.
And Tis was pleased that he had managed to rack up more experience for those young players in a game that also got City back on the points trail.
He continued: “It was a really good experience for our young players. They’ve learned a lot from it and they would hopefully have relished it, and it’ll give them more experience going into next time it happens.