Brady delighted with work ethic and resilience of his players after Colchester win

Cobblers boss Jon Brady praised the work ethic and resilience of his players after they dug out a crucial 1-0 victory over Colchester United on Saturday.

Louis Appéré’s first-half goal gave Town the lead in Essex before missed chances almost came back to bite them as Colchester piled on late pressure, but they just about held on for a first win in five.

"It’s a good win for us,” said Brady. “I thought the players really put themselves on the line today and worked extremely hard and I feel they have done that over the last few weeks.

"We didn’t quite get the result last weekend but we had the chances to go and make it two. We allowed Grimsby two chances and they took them both but today (Tom) Kingy makes a good save and the header at the end goes wide.

“We had a lot of chances in the second-half. They cleared two or three off the line and it would have been nice to put it to bed but it was a tough game and you can see they have recruited well and really improved – they had real strength coming off their bench.

"You watch a lot of games in the league and it seems to be quite a battle at the moment because of the pitches and there’s moments of good play and passages of good play and we had some good openings and created more chances than they did.

"They piled on the pressure at the end but what pleased me was that we stood up to it and stood strong and the players showed their resilience.”