Opposition view: Scunthorpe's Doig defends Oliver after sending off

Oliver competed for a loose ball inside the six-yard box and accidentally caught Rory Watson in the face, forcing the Scunthorpe goalkeeper to leave the pitch with a nasty facial injury.

It seemed no more than an accidental coming together but the linesman flagged furiously and advised referee Trevor Kettle to send off Oliver, which bemused both the striker and Cobblers boss Keith Curle.

“I didn’t actually see the contact made," said Doig, who took over press duties from Iron boss Paul Hurst. "When you see Rory come off, his face is in a pretty bad way.

"But I think the striker had to go for it and I don’t think there was any intent in his challenge, but he’s obviously caught Rory and the referee has seen something to make it a red card.

"Rory will get a scan on Monday to see if there’s any damage structurally to his face and we’ll then take it from there."

The red card came eight minutes into the second-half and by that stage the game was already over following Lee Novak's early brace and a goal for former Town man Kevin van Veen.

“If you’d have said that we’d win 3-0 before the game, I’d have bitten your hand off for it," added Doig. "It was a very strong performance in the first-half with three very good goals which put us in a commanding position.“We would have liked to have gone on and be more progressive in the second-half and score a couple more goals. Unfortunately, it didn’t pan out that way but I’m not going to stand here and be critical of the lads.

"We’ve won the game, scored three goals and kept a clean sheet. As much as maybe we could have been better in the second-half, we have to take confidence from the win and move on.“A big positive is the clean sheet. We did say at half-time we wanted them to go on and be more dominant in the second-half, trying to get another goal or two if possible.

"It doesn’t always pan out that way. Playing against ten men,, we have to give Northampton a bit of credit, but we’d have liked it to have been better."