An emphatic win for the Cumbrians on their longest trip of the season on Saturday was earned off the back of an energetic and positive performance from the whole team.
For midfielder Owen Moxon it brought assist number 11 for the campaign, when he fed a beauty of a pass through for the rampaging Omari Patrick, and goal number five, a jinking run that had everybody smiling when he finished it off.
“It was definitely a good performance and obviously a good result off the back of that,” he told us on Monday afternoon. “The scoreline shows that and it’s just nice when you go away from home, when it’s that far on the bus and you’ve stayed over the night before, it’s just good to get the result at the end of it. It makes the journey back a hell of a lot easier and everyone was buzzing.
“The thing is, they’re a good side, I know they’re near the bottom of the league at the moment, but they are a very good side with some good players. They like to play football so it was about pressing high up the pitch and working hard.
“Everybody goes out there and works hard every week and we knew that if we outworked them we’d get chances. We knew we could put them under pressure by pressing and using the energy we’ve got. It worked and we came away with the three points, and five goals as well, which actually could have been more.”
That pressing aspect has been a feature of the way Paul Simpson has set his team up and a key factor in the high number of goals the team has scored.
“I think we’ve done that quite a lot this season,” he told us. “Sometimes teams might get out on us, but we pride ourselves on working hard and we know that if we can force errors we can pounce on them.
“We’ve seen so many times that errors lead to goals, and stuff like that, we’ve seen it happen to us, so it was about us putting them under as much pressure as we could.
“We had to keep working hard all the way through the game and it’s then about limiting our errors so that we could get at them and make them be the team to make the mistakes. That happened at the weekend and we got our goals and the win, so happy days.”
The convincing manner of the win snowballed from a fantastic first goal, set up by Jon Mellish and finished by Joel Senior.
“The first goal came quite early in the game and that does take a bit of weight off your shoulders when it goes in,” he told us. “It is such a long way from home so you want to start well – but saying that we had some following again!
“It just feels like a home game anyway when you get that. I was buzzing for Joel, and Mels just did what Mels does. He causes carnage somehow and then what a ball he put in, and there’s Joel at the back post.
“Like I say, that settles you down for the game and it gives you that extra lift. They go under a little bit and we capitalised on it, and we then went on to score three more goals in that half.
“And all four of them were right in front of our fans. It’s definitely a boost, because if you think of away games, like Hartlepool for example, we had chances but we didn’t start great.
“We then kick towards our fans and they get going, so you get going, and the chances seem to just keep coming after that. Salford was the same, so it does give you that extra lift.
“What support we have every week but for the fans to make that journey in those numbers, and I saw that people were flying from Edinburgh and all sorts, it really is good. You want to celebrate in front of them and they do give you a boost for the rest of the game.”
Almost as satisfying as a goal for the middle of the park playmaker is providing for others, which is exactly what he did for United’s second of the day.
“It is good to get a pass through like that and I was buzzing for Omari to score,” he admitted. “I thought it was maybe going to run through a little bit too much but he’s rapid, isn’t he.
“If he hadn’t caught it I’d have been complaining. It was a great finish and I think it comes from us pressing and not giving them time to pick a pass. They slashed at the clearance, and I think it was Joel Senior that picked it up and played a nice pass inside.
“The gap opened and I could see that Omari was through. It is good and that it comes from us not giving them any time on the ball. We get chances from that when we do it.
“Getting the assists are important, and I’m happy with my form, but I do still think there’s more to come from me, and from everyone else as well. That’s a good thing to have in your mind when we’ve got 13 games left.
“To know there’s more to come on a personal level, and from the team, is a really good thing. I think the weekend’s result shows that we’ve got through that spell where it was a bit of a sticky patch. We’ve come out and scored five goals again and hopefully we can continue with what we did there.
“It doesn’t always go as smooth as that, where we can just go and do it again, but that’s what we aim to do every week. If we work hard every week, which I know everyone will, results like that will hopefully keep coming.”
But, what about that goal? At what point did it turn from I’ve got the ball to, right, I’m having a go?
“I don’t really know!” he revealed. “I thought it was going to be a foul at first. I’m not going to lie, I was knackered after it, I couldn’t even celebrate. I’d been on a run just before that, and the pitch was horrible, it was so heavy.
“It just fell to me and I tried to look for a pass, but there was nobody there. I thought ah well, I’ll just run, and I sort of forgot what happened because I was that tired. I really don’t know, there was just nothing else there, so I thought I’d just go for it. Thankfully it worked.
“I’m not sure I’ve ever scored one like it. I’d have to have a look back through the videos of my old goals. I don’t think there will be one like that.
“It was good, getting on the scoresheet again, because I haven’t scored for a while. That’s one of the things I want to keep adding and that’s why I keep saying that there’s more to come from me.
“I was buzzing when I saw it hit the back of the net and there was no thought in my mind of going down for a penalty, even though I watched it back and thought that it would definitely have been one if I’d fallen. The best thing is that it helps the boys to get the three points.”
When he talks about personal improvements, does that include getting a goal here at Brunton Park?
“Oh, I know, and somebody was actually saying that to me on the way into work,” he replied. “I don’t know why I keep scoring away, but every time I get a decent chance here the keeper pulls off a worldie save or I’m just not getting too many good chances at home. I’m sure they will come before the end of the season.”
With 13 games left to play it’s the collective that has put the club in a good position at this stage of the campaign.
“I think we’re all just singing off the same hymn sheet in terms of doing the basics, working hard, and the chances create themselves sometimes with the way we play,” he told us. “If we can do this week in and week out we’ll be giving ourselves a foundation to get more opportunities.
“I just think everybody wants the same goal, they all want to work hard through the week and we want to give everything when we go out on a Saturday. If we carry it on, I think we should get over the line in terms of winning games and being where we want to be at the end of the season.
“I know people will be sick of hearing it, because everyone keeps saying the same thing, but it’s just literally taking it game by game. That’s what we do, and it sounds very boring, but there’s no point in looking too far ahead or looking back even.
“As we’ve seen, things in a season can change very quickly. We had that three-game spell where we didn’t win and we couldn’t score, but then it changes and we get the 1-0 against Colchester and we’re off again.
“It maybe wasn’t too pretty, but we then go and score five at the weekend. That probably could have been eight or nine with the way we played. Things can change, and that’s why we take everything game by game. You have to concentrate on the next game and forget about the last one.”
“We’re all buzzing to be where we are and we just want to keep that going,” he continued. “The more the fans are getting excited and getting behind us the more it gives us a boost.
“We obviously all want the same thing as the fans but we do need to take each one as it comes. If they keep coming out in their numbers, like they have done all season, and if we can get a few more down as well, it all helps to give us that extra push. That’ll be perfect.
“We all want the same thing so let’s do it together. I saw that the young lads had given up their half-term to do the Warwick and that’s amazing. I think it looks a lot better and it shows that everyone is in it together.
“We all need to pull our weight wherever we can and we’re definitely doing that on the pitch. The fans are doing that off the pitch, so it’s good.
“We all hope to get to the same end goal and the more everybody gets involved and does their bit, and the more we keep making things happen, hopefully it’ll help us to keep picking up those points.”
