Brady praises substitute's impact after Cobblers 'tensed up' against Scunthorpe

Cobblers boss Jon Brady admitted his side 'tensed up' after taking the lead against Scunthorpe United on Saturday.

Town dominated during the period between half-time and Danny Rose's 64th-minute opener against the 10-man visitors but things became much more even thereafter.

Scunthorpe had nothing to lose and suddenly started throwing men forward, while Town dropped off a fraction looking to protect their slender lead.

However, Dylan Connolly came off the bench to give Cobblers an outlet down their left side, and he was instrumental in Sam Hoskins makings things safe in stoppage-time.

"Once we got the goal, for five minutes, Scunthorpe freed up a little bit and we tensed up a little bit and the game went into a funny mode," admitted Brady.

"It's human nature because the opposition have got to go for it and we tighten up and if you think back a couple of weeks, it was 1-1 against Rochdale and the game was on a knife-edge and we ended up losing.

"All things put into context, you can understand why there might be a bit of tightness, but I thought Dylan Connolly did really well, not only with the second goal but also a couple of his runs outstripped the defence and put them on the back foot and swung the momentum back our way.

"We came through and when you burst a bubble like that, you can move forward and I felt it was important we did that."

Cobblers did show good patience and discipline to keep creating chances at 0-0 before Rose eventually broke through.

Brady added: "When you're working for the win, you never give up and you keep trying to find ways and probe and you look at the stats, we built momentum throughout the second-half.

"The chances built and built and built and if you keep knocking on the door, you're going to bang it down eventually. We tried to play in the right way and move the ball quickly and keep the tempo high and credit to all of the players for that.

"They didn't stop believing and they're the ones implementing it out on the pitch and it was really good."