Manager Paul Simpson has issued a blunt warning to his Shrewsbury Town side: Improve quickly, or our promotion dream will be dashed.

Richard Walker’s 57th minute strike was enough for a local derby victory over struggling Chester at the Prostar Stadium last night.

That propelled Town into fourth place in League Two, although all of their promotion rivals have at least one game in hand.

And Simpson was far from impressed with his side’s display – even going as far as to describe it as the worst of his 11 months at the club.

“We were a disgrace last night in my opinion,” said Simpson. “I’m delighted we have got three points but that level of performance isn’t acceptable – the level of ability we have shown, the decision-making when we have created opportunities.

“We have got a fantastic carrot to go for. We are talking about promotion and that’s not a team that looks like it’s going to get promotion with the way we went about it.

“That’s as poor a performance as we have had while I’ve been at the club – and that’s even last season when I thought we had a poor side.

“Yes, we have created chances but we have to be better than that. For a team that wants to be achieving things and a team that wants to go on and do something we need to improve and we have to do it quickly.”

Simpson admitted he was far happier with the result than the performance.

“We weren’t right – it’s as simple as that,” he added. “The way we went about it last night wasn’t acceptable.

“We were poor and, in all honesty, we didn’t deserve to win the game.

“We got out of jail with the one that hit the post (from Kevin Ellison) and the chance that (Richie) Partridge missed.

“If I hadn’t been in football for so long and realised how cruel it can be, a bit of me would feel sorry for Chester that they didn’t get anything out of it because we didn’t deserve to win it.

“I’m delighted we have got three points and we might have moved up a few places.

“This should have been a game – with the way it went particularly second half – where we should have been looking at having a massive change around on our goal difference.”

By JAMES GARRISON