Bristol City manager Liam Manning praised Nahki Wells for his “terrific character” after he came off the bench to score the game’s only goal at Plymouth.
Half-time substitute Wells scored the Robins’ 57th-minute winner, dropping Argyle to 21st in the Championship, one point above the relegation zone after five consecutive home defeats without scoring.
Manning said of the striker, Nahki is a fantastic character; I’m delighted for him that he came on and scored the winner for us.
In the first half, we expected them to come at us, with the home fans creating a buzz and rallying behind them.
Obviously, their setup was more aggressive and front-footed. For the first 20-25 minutes, we braved the storm, as is necessary at times.
We changed it from a five to a four 20 minutes in, allowing us to apply greater pressure. For the final 15 minutes of the first half, we got back into it and were more in their half than ours.
I thought we did a terrific job of following through and then regaining control.
We made three changes at halftime, which I want to emphasise were not performance-related.
I expected the energy to be crucial in the second half, and it did.
It’s good to have the experience and quality that allows us to make changes during the game.
The physical demands of this league at this point in the season are enormous. I believe the international break came at a great time for us.
You sometimes need time to consolidate and reflect. I believe that the two-week foreign vacation allowed us to recharge and refocus.
We were confident after Friday’s performance, but today’s challenge was different.
Before the Leicester game, we discussed resetting after the international break and an eight-game season. We have won the first two.
Plymouth’s head coach, Ian Foster, said: “We were the better side for much of the game.
They switched to a back four and made three substitutions at halftime. That tells you something about how we played.
“The performance was great for the majority of the game. We became increasingly frustrated as the game progressed.
Everyone wants to be together. You cannot blame the players’ application. We just need to be more ruthless when we get the chance. We have to do better.
We had ample possession and opportunities, and we needed to score.
We’re all disappointed.” We are doing everything we can to break the spell we are under.
Our focus shifts to the next game (Rotherham away), which is critical for us. However, all games are now massively popular.
Nobody is happy when they don’t win football games. We accept responsibility and work hard to win games of football.
When luck isn’t on your side, it’s not.
We keep working really hard. In these moments, you learn about yourself. We are desperate to stay in this division and are battling to do so, as you can see from the players’ applications.
