John Askey happy as Town find winning touch against Accrington
John Askey was pleased as his Shrewsbury Town team found a 'knack' of winning as they ended Accrington Stanley's 10-match unbeaten run.
Alex Gilliead's goal in a 1-0 win earned Town their second success of the League One season to lift them from 20th to 16th.
The visitors played more than 75 minutes with 10 men at Montgomery Waters Meadow after keeper Connor Ripley was sent off for hacking down Lee Angol. Town made hard work of taking advantage before the breakthrough after the hour mark.
The victory eased pressure on Askey, whose side had previously struggled to turn draws into wins.
"I'm happy with the three points, it was hard work," said Askey.
"It was three points we badly needed. We should've scored more goals but we take the three points.
"It's hard when you've not won. We only had the one win, I know we haven't lost many, but you sometimes lose the knack of how to do it.
"You can panic when you don't need to because of the situation but I felt we limited them to very few chances, which we should do, we created a lot ourselves.
"We've got to start putting the ball into the back of the net to give my heart a rest."
Stanley had not lost since the opening day of the season and were fifth before kick-off.
The visitors started well with ex-Salop man Jordan Clark catching the eye but the red card changed the complexion of the match.
"Lee got there before the goalkeeper and it's a foul," the boss added.
"If it's outside the box and stops a goalscoring opportunity then it's a sending off. It's as simple as that really."
Askey heaped praise on the support inside Montgomery Waters Meadow for sticking with the players as the 10 men of Stanley were proving a tough nut to crack.
The boss continued: "It puts pressure on the players (playing against 10 men).
"You've got to take advantage of the situation. At times it got the better of us, you could see a little bit of panic in one or two players.
"But I thought the supporters helped. They didn't get on the players' backs.
"It's quite easy to do that playing against 10 men but their support helped the lads to re-settle on the ball and that's why we got the victory, there was no real panic from the stands."
Askey said on the crucial goal: "We'd been talking about the wide men getting in the box more.
"He's a big lad and if he can get in the box more there'll be more headers. It was a great ball in and a good header and I'm just pleased it went in."
