COD ARMY HAVE DONNY ALL AT SEA
FLEETWOOD TOWN ended their winless run in emphatic style as they demolished high-flying Doncaster Rovers.
Boss Joey Barton praised the professionalism of his side as they ended a six-game streak without a victory thanks to goals from Ched Evans, James Wallace, Ashley Eastham and Ashley Hunter.
Fleetwood defended very well after taking an early lead and showed superb ruthlessness to go 4-0 up within 49 minutes.
“Goals do change games,” Barton said. “The key for us is going on. The difficult thing in football is getting to 2-0 and we’ve not necessarily done that enough this season.
“In the second half we did defend properly. You’ve got to go and keep the back door closed, which we did, and that was really pleasing.”
Evans gave Fleetwood the lead from the spot on four minutes after the striker himself was recklessly brought down by goalkeeper Marko Marosi.
Doncaster had chances through Mallik Wilks, Joe Wright and John Marquis, but Fleetwood doubled their advantage on 34 minutes when Wallace powered in a header from a corner.
Marquis spurned a glorious chance to pull Rovers back into it when firing well over the bar from 10 yards.
And it was quickly punished as the visitors effectively sealed the game in firsthalf stoppage time when Eastham headed in from another corner.
Before Doncaster had any hopes of a second-half fightback, Wright’s hesitancy in possession allowed Hunter to nip the ball away and slot past Marosi on 49 minutes.
Grant McCann said Doncaster were dealt a lesson in just how tough the league can be when a side is not on their game. He pointed to mistakes at both ends of the field, particularly an uncharacteristic lack of ruthlessness in front of goal.
“We’ve had a tremendous start to the season, but you saw today with other results just how tough this league is,” he said.
“If you want to step off it, and take your finger off the pulse, then you can get hurt. That is what we did. We made four mistakes that cost us the game really.
“I know this sounds really strange but we played well in the first half in terms of the chances we created. “I just feel it was a tale of both boxes, conceding off two set plays, a couple of mistakes and then at the other end we didn’t take our chances. “We got what we deserved from that. If you don’t take your chances and defend like that then you’re going to punished in this league. “I said to the group afterwards that we’re all human. We all make mistakes.”