Gaffer reacts to the 1-0 win over Fleetwood
Shrewsbury Town boss Paul Hurst praised his side’s never-say-die attitude as they scored late to see off Fleetwood Town.
Toto Nsiala popped up with a header in the 88th minute to extend Town’s unbeaten run to 15 games.
“It was an exciting end”, said Hurst.
“A lot of it in-between wasn’t the best spectacle, partly because of the conditions, partly because of the opposition, but the team that was trying to win the game finally did in the end.
“At half-time part of the message was to keep focused and to remain patient. It wasn’t the prettiest of games, but we had to make sure we took something.
“If it had been 0-0 then we would have had to take that because of the opposition and the weather conditions, but put on two strikers, changed formation to win the game and although it didn’t come directly from that it’s paid dividends.”
Town left it late, but Hurst was delighted to see Toto rise highest and head the winner.
“I was looking at Omar in truth – thinking ‘is it going to be his moment?’, admitted Paul.
“I saw him and Toto get together and then I saw Toto rise and saw he was going to head it. Once it set off in that direction it certainly looked like it had a good chance, but it seemed to go in slow motion before it finally went in the net and sparked the celebrations from the players, the staff and obviously the fans.”
The Town boss admitted that this game gave him as much, if not more, satisfaction that Tuesday night’s 4-0 win and he was pleased with his side’s defensive resilience.
“I was pleased with a clean sheet”, Paul continued.
“They’ve got some good forward players. McAleny looks a threat, but we limited him to very little. Cole’s got pace, Hiwula comes on who’s a good player, Hunter’s sharp and quick, so there were threats there, but I think at times they were left isolated and that helped us stay on the front-foot”
The one worry was the injury to Junior Brown and Paul is fearing the worst.
“It’s something with his knee”, Hurst said.
“Junior’s quite loose in all his joints anyway, so it’s difficult for Chris (Skitt) to give a definite assessment at the time and I’m pretty sure we will need a scan to determine exactly what it is.
“I do fear the worst, but hopefully I’m wrong and it’s just something that’s caught and given him pain, so fingers-crossed for Junior.”