Alan Browne may have scored better goals this season, but his strike this afternoon may have topped the lot as his goal ensured North End’s season goes down to the wire.
Browne’s strike on 57 minutes proved to be the only goal of the game as Alex Neil’s side dug in to record three points at Bramall Lane today, and Browne admits he’s feeling confident when up in front of goal.
To iFollowPNE post-match, Browne said: “You need a run of games to get yourself going and I think I’m more confident than I ever was and you can see that in my game that I’m starting to add goals to my game.
"It's a huge part with what the gaffer wanted me to do and fortunately, the last few months or so I’ve found myself in good areas and managed to score some goals so hopefully I can continue that.
“I found myself at right wing back which I’m not too familiar with but the gaffer wanted me to go and do a job and I knew with Josh’s quality when he hit it that the ‘keeper might not catch it and maybe another player might not have followed in but I wanted to get in there and see if he spilled it and fortunately it fell to me and it was a goal to get us over the line so I’m thrilled with that.”
The game itself was far from a classic with North End far from their best, but the win means there’s just two points separating them and sixth place heading into the Burton game next Sunday, and Browne spoke of the magnitude of today’s victory taking into consideration the threat that the Blades posed.
He continued: “We knew coming here they were going to be tough to break down and tough to play against. We knew they break in numbers going forward and we tried to counter that and it worked out well for us.
They’re a newly promoted club and they’ve earned a lot of respect this year in terms of competing for the Play-Offs in their first year back but as I said it was always going to be a tough game but we did what we needed to do and got the three points.
“With the freshness we had in the squad with us changing a few, we wanted to break them down but it wasn’t really working for us at half-time.
“There’s huge competition for places and nobody can take their place for granted. Barky’s played nearly every game this season but he’s been on the bench today, and that’s probably to give him a rest more than anything as he’s had a long season but the boys who have came in have done fantastic for us.”
Watch Alan’s full interview on iFollowPNE now.