Jon Brady praises players as Northampton continue winning start to campaign

Posted Sunday, August 15, 2021 by PA

Northampton boss Jon Brady saluted his players’ efforts after they maintained their 100 per cent record with a 1-0 triumph at Colchester.

Jon Guthrie’s 22nd-minute winner secured a third successive victory for the Cobblers, who extended their winning start to the new season despite finishing the game with 10 men.

Brady said: “It was tough but I thought we controlled the game in the first half and in the second half, it went their way.

“They’re going to have periods but it just showed how strong defensively we looked.

“The biggest thing for us was that we’ve had 24 hours less to recover and some players have come back from Covid and played two 90 minutes in a row.

“I’m pleased for the players and their efforts and I’m pleased for the staff but ultimately, I’m pleased that it’s three different types of win as well.

“We played against Port Vale where there wasn’t really too much threat from them and then on Wednesday night, we played against Championship opposition (Coventry) and then come from 1-0 down and then today when we were under the cosh in the second half especially and down to 10 men, we’ve had loads of different scenarios over the last three games and we’ve rolled out on top three times.”

Guthrie followed up to score Northampton’s winner from close range after initially being denied by U’s keeper Shamal George, following Sam Hoskins’ free-kick into the box.

And the Cobblers almost doubled their lead in first-half stoppage-time when Luke Chambers cleared Kion Etete’s close-range effort off the line.

Colchester improved after half-time and keeper Liam Roberts denied Brendan Wiredu and Freddie Sears, before Northampton’s Fraser Horsfall was shown a straight red card for a deliberate handball with five minutes remaining but the visitors held on.

Colchester head coach Hayden Mullins was disappointed with rthe result.

He said: “Football is a cruel game sometimes but we didn’t help ourselves in the first half.

“We were too flat and we allowed them to control the tempo of the game.

“They slowed it down every opportunity they had, with every throw and every free-kick, every goal-kick – it was just so slow and there was no flow to the game in the first half.

“They got their goal which was poor from us and they held onto it.

“Then we’re always trying to force the issue and I don’t think we really did it, in the first half.

“We didn’t really get the tempo going and we got sucked into their game plan.

“The goal gave them something to hang onto and there was a lot of gamesmanship from there with them slowing the game down.

“We were good in the second half, very good and we created a number of chances.”