Winger Jordan Gibson has been catching the eye recently, with two goals from his last three appearances complemented by some attractive play, and he was praised again by manager Keith Millen for the calm way in which he dealt with the stress of a delayed penalty at Stevenage last week.
“I think he showed how brave he is,” he said. “He works really hard for the team out of possession, but in possession for the penalty he picked the ball up, was strong and drew the foul.
“So that was brave, and I was also pleased with how calm he was. When you have that delay, once the penalty’s been given, it’s not a nice feeling for the penalty taker.
“The lad needed treatment for a long time, I was thinking this isn’t good, having to wait this long. He stayed calm and finished it. He’s full of confidence and is one of our creative players.”
“I like how creative he is,” he added. “At half-time on Saturday I did say that we needed to get him on the ball more.
“We couldn’t get him on the ball enough, whereas Brennan [Dickenson] on the other side was having more impact in possession.
“We spoke to him, because he’s dangerous, and I want him picking the ball up in those areas.”
And he spoke again about how last Saturday had been an example of a team of players making a system work.
“We controlled the game for the most part because the individuals played well within the structure of the team,” he explained. “That’s why we didn’t feel the need to use substitutes.
“I was looking at whether or not legs were running out and just when I thought one of them was tired, they’d sprint back again.
“I don’t change things for the sake of it, and the only one I really made was near the end when I brought Corey [Whelan] on, because I felt we needed another defensive body in our box.
“They had a couple of balls go in where we were outnumbered, and the two headers they had were purely down to that. It was an indication of how fit the group are that they could go the whole game.
“The front two worked their socks off, and I’ve said for a while now that if our strikers are doing that for the team, they might not be scoring the goals but they’re being very effective in helping the rest of the team stay solid.”
