Maidstone victory had raised hope
MACCLESFIELD Town made it three wins in their last four games as they beat Maidstone United 3-0 at the Moss Rose.
Macclesfield Town manager John Askey praised the mentality of his played after his team won 3-0 against Maidstone to keep their play-off ambitions alive.
An early effort from Rhys Browne and two late strikes in as many minutes from Danny Whitaker and Jack Mackreth saw Macc banish memories of Saturday’s 4-1 home defeat to Dagenham & Redbridge.
The ability to see his side bounce back from such a humbling defeat at the weekend, impressed Askey and he had hoped Town could continue that as the season reaches its conclusion.
“When we were so disappointing against Dagenham and Redbridge I thought it showed the character of the team that we have shown all season,” said Askey.
“It was a good performance, we could have scored more goals but they could have had one or two.
“But I thought throughout the game we created a lot of chances.”
With two assists and a goal, Town’s head-coach was quick to praise winger Rhys Browne and his contribution to Tuesday night’s win.
He said: “If we can get Rhys on the ball of course we can cause teams problems, we were playing him on the wing and teams have marked him tightly so tonight we tried to free him up.
“Having said that when he went wide left, he went and won us the penalty and so made a goal for the third when we went four three three.
“So it was good to have him and we need to get him on the ball as much as we can.”
Prior to the game, the boss made a wholesome five changes to the starting 11 that was humbled by Maidstone.
There were starts for Chris Holroyd and Danny Whitehead after returning from injury, George Pilkington came into the defence and there were also starts from the outset for Mackreth and goalkeeper Craig Ross.
This seemed to be an inspired decision as the home side found themselves in the lead after 58 seconds.
Spinning on a six pence, Browne turned his opposite number well and where he was met with a one v one scenario the winger made no mistake, calmly slotting the ball home to notch his second of the season.
John McCombe was unfortunate not to double Macc’s lead 15 minutes later but his header from Whittaker’s corner was blocked by Tom Mills.
The first real chance in vain for the visitors was when defender Jamie Coyle’s shot was blocked in what was disappointing first stage of the game for Maidstone.
The half ended with chances for Chris Holroyd and Whittaker but each player could not capitalise
After the restart it was beginning to feel like missed opportunities would cost home side after Browne missed a great chance at 1-0.
But the winger made amends as he tricked and turned his way into winning a penalty, one in which Whitaker made no mistake in dispatching.
Browne then made it two assists for the afternoon as his ball found Mackreth following a swift counter-attack, and the Liverpool-born forward rounded off a good afternoon for Town, stroking his left footed strike away.