Stanley’s perfect tribute to director

ACCRINGTON boss John Coleman dedicated his side’s crucial win over Notts County to club director Geoff Heap, who died last month.

The club stalwart’s funeral was held earlier this week which Coleman and his players attended to pay tribute to Heap, who has been involved with the club since the 1960s.

Accrington produced a performance that Heap would have been proud of as goals from Harvey Rodgers and Noor Husin secured a win which took them further away from League Two’s drop zone.

Coleman said he was thrilled with the win and there was only one man on his mind at fulltime.

“I am delighted with the win and I dedicate that to Geoff Heap,” he said.

“We have lost a great servant to Accrington Stanley.

“It was his funeral this week and he will be sorely missed. It is fitting that we have come away with a win in his memory.

“It was a hard-fought and deserved victory.

“I am just glad we are not talking about the ref at the end because we had a stonewall penalty turned down .

“The good thing for me is that we are talking about winning the game rather than not winning a penalty.”

Magpies boss Kevin Nolan was disappointed with his side’s performance having come into the game on the back of a fine win against Crawley last weekend.

But his side couldn’t maintain that level of performance against a committed Stanley team whose defender Omar Beckles was outstanding.

Rodgers opened the scoring when he nodded home a pinpoint Sean McConville cross.

And fellow loanee Husin wrapped it up when he tapped home after Adam Collin had saved Jonny Edwards’ effort.

Notts registered just one shot on target and Nolan, who gave former Newcastle striker Shola Ameobi his debut, said his side needed more consistency.

“I was disappointed,” said Nolan. “It seems like we are on a wave at the minute. We get everything right and look really good then the week after, we go away from that.

“We probably didn’t deserve the 2-0 scoreline. We had a few shouts for a penalty in the second half when Stead was bundled over, but it wasn’t given.

“It’s just disappointing because we didn’t match them physically.

“I thought we had a better second half than first. But we can’t be relying on that. We only responded when we went a goal down which was disappointing.”