Assistant manager Glynn Snodin says a few choice words at half-time from manager Simon Grayson and himself were needed in the Lilywhites’ dressing room.
‘Snods’ spoke to the media after game and admitted that some industrial Yorkshire language from him and gaffer was needed to get the team going having come in 0-0 at the interval.
“They usually get good cop, bad cop, but today they got bad cop, bad cop,” joked the PNE No.2.
“In the second half we got a reaction and in the end it was nothing more than we deserved. The first half wasn’t good from our point of view. We have standards at this Club and we fell below them in the first half.
“The second half was a different game. It is frustrating, because it is a game of 90 minutes and we want to make this place a fortress, but the first half it certainly wasn’t, but we were happy at the end of the game.”
Despite not being in top form in the first half the side still dominated the chances and as the game went past the hour mark the shot count – which in the end totalled an amazing 26, with 14 of them on target – kept climbing and Snodin admitted he was worried it was ‘one of those afternoons’.
“You worry, because they had Pilks [Kevin Pilkington] in goal, who hadn’t played for two years and everything hit him or he made great saves; they also had ones cleared off the line and you think is it going to be one of those days again
“But, credit to the boys, they kept going and Craig came up with the goods.”
Craig Davies impressed on his debut, winning the George Banks Jewellers man of the match and the PNE assistant boss feels the recruitment of the Bolton man is a real coup for the Club.
“I thought he did very well. We know he’s a powerful player, he can cause defenders problems with his pace and his strength and you could see today he has an eye for goal and a great strike on him.
“We feel we have got a very good player. He scored goals for Barnsley and Bolton in the Championship and we were surprised when they agreed to let him out, we feel it is a real coup for us.
“Strikers win you games and it is great to have a few of them available to us now. You never know when you might need them all, so we look good in that area.”
The game finished 2-0, but with the second dominance so strong it could have finished four or five, but Glynn was happy to earn the win and continue to make progress: “The performance after half time was very good. Pilks made some good saves, but it is still three points.
“We can now go into Wednesday full of confidence in what will be a really difficult test for us.
“It is nice to look at the monitor at the end of the game and see other teams have dropped points. We will just keep moving along nice and steadily, hopefully picking up the points towards where we want to be.”