Duff delighted with the quality and fight in win
NOTTS COUNTY 0 CHELTENHAM 3
MICHAEL Duff hailed the quality and character of his Cheltenham Town side as they earned his first victory in the Football League at Notts County.
The result meant managerless County slipped into the League Two relegation zone after Cheltenham leapfrogged them following a fine victory at Meadow Lane.
Duff, pictured right, saw his side extend their unbeaten run to five games with a superb three-goal triumph thanks to Luke Varney’s brace and Tyrone Barnett’s late third.
The manager said after the game: “I’ve said for the last few weeks that I’ve got belief in what I do and belief in what the players can do, so it was changing the mentality and there’s a bit of belief in the group now and hopefully that showed today.
“In the first half we had to fight. We showed a bit of character and weathered a bit of a storm for 15 or 20 minutes, because we started well, but stopped using the ball and went back to front too long, which is a little bit of what we did at Ebbsfleet last week. But we rode it out and I thought second half we were excellent. We knocked the ball around and I thought it could have been even more than that to be honest.
“The togetherness and the application that they’ve shown, and with the quality, you have to fight, so it’s no good being good with the ball if you’ve never got it, which is what I’ve said before and why we changed the shape. It allowed us in different areas of the pitch and I thought we used it really well today.”
In a dire first half, Enzio Boldewijn had the first shot after 30 minutes for Notts when he cut inside from the right, but drilled his effort off-target.
Cheltenham took the lead ten minutes before half-time when Ryan Broom’s cross was met by the unmarked Luke Varney, who headed home in style.
Chris Hussey wasted a glorious chance to put the visitors two-up when he was put clean through, only for goalkeeper Ross Fitzsimons to make a superb save.
County made a tactical switch at half-time as they changed from three at the back to 4-4-2, but it did not have the desired effect.
Varney doubled the visitors’ lead when he crashed in a superb finish from a well-worked corner, before Barnett wrapped things up late on with a close-range finish.