Manager on the Doncaster victory
United manager Greg Abbott gave us his reaction to the fantastic 2-0 away victory at the Keepmoat Stadium on Tuesday night.
“I thought it was a magnificent team performance,” he said. “We’ve been on a little run recently and we came here feeling really confident.
“We have a system which the players have responded to and they all worked really hard and stuck to the game plan. That’s important because Doncaster are in a situation where they are desperate for the points they need to secure their promotion.
“Right through the side we stuck to our tasks and we created some really good chances. We could easily be talking about two or three more goals and that’s a pat on the back for the way the players have done their jobs.”
“It was important for us to defend properly first and foremost,” he added. “If we’d let them get in front then things would have been very difficult for us.
“They have some big, physical players and we knew they’d throw everything at us. The good thing for me was that we looked really comfortable with everything we were doing tonight. We defended as a unit and we supported the forward players in numbers. It was a really good team performance.”
“We have to mention our two full backs,” he continued. “Brad Potts looked good there on Saturday but he grew into the job in this one. He looked like he’d been there all his life. Jordan Mustoe is getting better and better all the time. He can read the game and he has improved on the defending side of his job a huge amount. We are really enjoying having him here.
“In front of them we had Liam [Noble] running all over the place and he has responded to being left out of the side in the best way possible. He has shown us what he is all about again. His second goal was typical of what he is because when he shows that level of energy and determination he is very hard to deal with.”
“I think a big thank you has to go to the fans,” he said. “At the start of the game all you could hear was the noise from the home crowd but we silenced them, and it was then all about the 300 from our end of things who made the noise.
“The last five or six games have been a reward for them because this has been a tough season. They’ve stuck by us and I hope they can see that we are determined to keep putting the effort in for them. They are always there for us and that’s something we really appreciate.”
“I think we can look right across the park and see some big performances,” he told us. “The midfield three played a huge part because they won their battles and brought everyone else into play. We looked a decent team and that’s what I am most pleased about."
“It’s still too early to say what the situation is with Paul [Thirlwell],” he explained. “It didn’t look good but we will get that assessed this week and we’ll take it from there.
“The good thing is that we have options and we have players who really want to do their bit. Danny Cadamarteri came on and looked like he was back to his best and there were players doing important shifts all over the park.
“If he [Thirlwell] isn’t available then we’ll miss him, because he does a big job for us. However, we’ll think about that later in the week. At the moment I think what we have to do is congratulate our players for what was a very good performance.”