Kevin Nolan 'proud' of his players after 'brilliant' comeback win over Mansfield
Kevin Nolan said he was ‘proud’ of his players for the way they fought back from a goal down to beat Mansfield Town 2-1 at Sixfields on Saturday.
On a three-game losing run and struggling to regain the early initiative after Rhys Oates’ 19th-minute opener, Cobblers could have gone under at an edgy Sixfields but instead they turned things around impressively through second half goals from Jack Perkins and Tom Eaves.
"I thought we played fine in the first half if I’m honest and I said to the lads at half-time, if we keep playing like that and keep putting them under pressure, we’ll get our rewards and we did,” said Nolan.
"We were good for the whole game but we got what we deserved in the second half. We made the sub at half-time, Kyle (Edwards) was unlucky to come off, but we put them under more pressure and it was a real good response by my lads from last week.
"We changed formations and we adapted and I’m really pleased that the boys bounced back because last week was a really poor showing. There was a bit of anxiety and a few jitters, which is what happens when you go 1-0 down, but I’m proud of how they handled it.
"I was as calm as anything in the nine minutes of stoppage-time because the crowd was brilliant and the lads were brilliant. There was a bit of a groan when nine minutes went up but these lads can go to 105 minutes if needed because we’ve done the work and I thought they saw it out wonderfully well.”