Cooper: The players were incredible

Yeovil Town manager Mark Cooper has hailed the performance of his players in tonight’s 2-1 win over Tamworth at Huish Park.

The boss admitted it had been “a difficult few days” after last weekend’s home defeat to Wealdstone extended their run without a National League win to more than two months.

Having fallen behind just before the half-hour mark, the Glovers turned in an impressive second half display which saw them pull level courtesy of a deflected Charlie Cooper strike before frontman Frank Nouble’s first goal in almost a year sealed the win on the hour.

Speaking to BBC Somerset’s Mark Stillman after the game, the manager said: “We had to work really hard after Saturday. The chairman (Martin Hellier), myself, the players to try and turn the negativity around and it had to start with desire and commitment and I thought the energy players provided to the stadium was incredible. To go 1-0 down in what could be a toxic atmosphere makes it an even greater performance, the players were top draw tonight.

“They are a really difficult team to play against, they have got points off the big teams and you know what is coming with ten minutes to go. They brought (long throw specialist Tom) Tonks on who is a good player with a missile of a throw which you know you are going to have to defend it. But the start of the second half was key, we got that goal and it gave the Thatcher’s the impetus and they drove us on.

“It has been a difficult few days and we showed a united front which is important. In today’s day and age, the way society and social media works, everything is about ‘now’ and you have to have everything now. People have to have everything now, but sometimes it takes time to build. We are trying to build this club back in, the owner has put an incredible amount of money in that he is never going to get back and we are trying to make it better.

“It is not going to happen overnight, but when you have a group of players with that commitment and show in negative times that they can do that, you know we can have a really good end to the season and put things in place where we can just do everything better, but it takes time.”

Cooper praised the performance of Nouble who was brought back in to the starting line-up having come off the bench towards the end of Saturday’s defeat. His winning strike was his first goal since the 1-0 win at Braintree Town in National League South on March 24th last year.

The boss said: “Frank is a proud man who has scored goals and to go that long without scoring would play on anyone’s mind, but even if you take away his goal, his performance was top draw. We had some eight or nines out of ten tonight and we have to do that more and more. It is about how do you bottle that desire to get that feeling of pure relief, but real pride at how we responded to get the win.”

One negative of the evening was the sight of on loan Port Vale midfielder James Plant limping off shortly after Yeovil’s second goal with what the manager said appears to be a hamstring injury.

Cooper added: “Aaron Jarvis is probably the best number nine in the league in my opinion, Morgan Williams is a top centre back, Sean McGurk is a top player, Jacob Maddox, they are big misses for us. James Plant has done his hamstring now, it looks like, so I am going to have to ask the chairman for some more money – which I know he is pleased about! But that happens to every club, sometimes you get injuries and sometimes people step up.”