Lee Bell wants Crewe focus quickly shifted to Stockport clash after going third

Posted Sunday, February 11, 2024 by PA

Crewe boss Lee Bell is happy for his players to enjoy their win over Crawley but says he wants minds quickly focused on Tuesday night’s clash at leaders Stockport.

Rio Adebisi’s second-half goal secured Crewe a first in win in three games and with promotion rivals Barrow and Wrexham both losing, the Railwaymen moved into the automatic promotion places in third spot.

They are three points behind second-placed Mansfield and seven points adrift of pacesetters Stockport, but with a chance to take a chunk out of that gap in midweek.

“It was a really good team performance and we will let the players enjoy that tonight, but they have got to stay focused as we have a very tough game on Tuesday night,” said Bell.

“It’s a game between two teams in the top three and we’ve got to take what we did here into that. We came out of the traps and we could have got a couple more goals I thought.

“We totally nullified Crawley, and they are a good footballing team too. I thought our back players were excellent and we limited them to a couple of long shots. Harvey Davies got his second clean sheet in successive games and Ed Turns has come in and done well for us.

“The players’ energy was very good and if we keep performing like that we are going to hurt the opposition.

“Rio did brilliantly just before he scored by getting into the box and he arrived there again to take the goal, which showed his athleticism.”

The sides were closely matched in the first half, but it was Crewe who went closest to taking the lead when Elliott Nevitt crashed a shot onto the post.

Crawley’s Adam Campbell may have done better with a shooting chance which fell his way inside the box, but he only managed a tame shot which Davies saved at the foot of his post.

After the break, Crewe moved up a gear and Adebisi’s close-range finish came soon after he had powered a header over at the end of a lung-busting run.

Conor Thomas’ persistence saw the midfielder put over a low cross at the second attempt and Adebisi ran into space to turn the ball home.

Thomas went close to increasing the lead with a header which glided the wrong side of the post before Crawley piled on some late pressure, with substitute Ronan Darcy coming close to an equaliser with a thunderous drive.

Despite falling to a fourth consecutive defeat in all competitions, Crawley boss Scott Lindsey was pleased with an improved display from his team.

“I thought we were really resilient against a really strong team who are likely to be going for automatic promotion,” said Lindsey.

“I thought we went toe to toe and we were defensively resolute apart from one moment when one player didn’t do his job properly.

“We are showing signs of improvement and we can take a lot from that. We created chances, although not clear cut ones, and had a lot of the play after the scored.

“I was proud of the players as they took a really strong Crewe side to the wire. The players who came on did well – Ronan (Darcy) and Jeremy Kelly were really bright for us.”

Lindsey also felt Crewe striker Aaron Rowe should have been shown a red card rather than a yellow for an early challenge.

He said: “I’ve seen it back and it is clear. I don’t really understand that and it changes the shape of the game if the officials do their jobs properly.”