Shrewsbury Town boss outlines key aspects of response in stunning comeback win

Gavin Cowan hailed Shrewsbury Town’s response to a dreadful start in the stunning comeback success at Crawley.

The visitors were on the ropes in the first 20 minutes and the struggling hosts - with just one League Two win all season - went 1-0 up and could have netted another two.

Shrewsbury found their feet as Cowan called for his side to be braver with the ball and was encouraged to see more courage in possession. He then revealed some “home truths” were given at half-time, which sparked what the boss felt was the best 45 minutes of the season in the second period at Broadfield Stadium.

“Our reaction - we’ve gone on there and had countless opportunities,” Cowan said.

“I know Crawley are down there, but their manager is a class act and the way they play football is brave and courageous, it’s very admirable. I can’t imagine they will continue to lose games being as brave as that.

“The way we coped with it, we did really well in difficult circumstances against them. They’re all good teams in this really competitive league.

“We had countless opportunities where the detail or quality has let us down, but we got our goalscorers on the sheet and they’ve got a bit of telepathy going on at the moment.”

Town’s front two Josh Davison and George Lloyd both took their goalscoring tallies for the season to four - the former with his side’s equaliser and then a dramatic 94th-minute winner.

Lloyd has four in seven games and once again saw a goal dubiously chalked off for offside.

Cowan added: “I felt like all over the park we made a decision after that first 20 minutes to be a little bit braver, and stay on the ball.

“Sean Parrish (first team coach) was in the stands. There was me shouting it and I was getting the communication from him as well.

“So we were all on the same wavelength, like we always are. We were really trying to drive that in the players.

“Once they got to grips with themselves, not with anyone else, their performance was excellence.”