Carlisle United manager Paul Simpson has given all the credit for Saturday’s win at Leyton Orient to the players.
The wave of Simmotion sweeping through Brunton Park and the supporters was not why the Blues picked up three precious points.
The manager said: “There are things we need to be better with, but we only had one training session then a light session on Friday, so I thought they were magnificent.
“That’s credit to them, it’s nothing to do with me. Players get you performances and results.”
Now Simpson is looking for the players to follow up in front of the home fans when they play Rochdale at Brunton Park tomorrow.
He’s likely to retain Jon Melling in defence after a surprise switch for last season’s top goalscorer.
Simpson has also revealed that it appeared as though his predecessor Keith Millen was going to make the same switch if he had still been there.
It was the first time for two years that Mellish had appeared in defence after being converted into an attacking midfield role.
Simpson explained: “I think the big thing I was thinking about was to get as much experience out there as possible. The staff were talking about a game six weeks ago where there were only 600 or so appearances in the eleven.
“We had over a thousand appearances between them out on the pitch at Orient and that makes a difference. Whether they’ve ever been in this situation before, I don’t know, but when you’ve got appearances under your belt you can actually deal with things better, and I thought they dealt with it really well.
“I’m led to believe that Keith was going to play Jon in defence in this game anyway, but I wrote a team out when I was waiting to find out what was going on, and I had Jon in there as well.
“When I came in and spoke to Gav he told me that was already the plan. That back three would have been what the previous manager would have done, by coincidence.
“They were excellent, they all put in some great headers and clearances. Mark [Howard] was excellent in goal as well.
“When I spoke to him about the game we talked about the fact that we didn’t want him to have to make any saves, but I felt like there would be one he’d have to pull out, and thankfully he did that. Let’s hope he doesn’t have to make many more.
“I said to the players before the game, when we got their team, that we were going to have to give up some height advantage.
“That meant they were going to have to be like a dog with a bone and get amongst them, be physical, compete and ruffle them up. I thought they were magnificent in the way they did that.
“I thought the players looked comfortable doing what I asked them to do, and it was good to get Jamie Devitt back in the side because of the quality he can bring.
“There’ll be more to come from him when he gets up to full match pace. We defended from the front, but we can’t rest on it.”
