Brewers boss happy with draw at Newport
Burton Albion manager Gary Rowett was pleased to earn a point from the 1-1 draw at Newport County on Easter Monday.
The Brewers went behind but levelled through Michael Symes, and Rowett accepts a draw was a fair result after conceding early on.
“We’re pleased with the point in light of the guarantee of a play-off place. I’d have loved to have won the game and kept us in the hunt for third place but it isn’t easy to do that. It’s not an easy place to come and they’re a strong, competitive team and they use their strengths well.
“I felt we struggled to deal with those strengths for the first ten minutes where we found ourselves a goal down. The penalty gave us a lifeline and we settled down a bit for the last fifteen minutes of the first half and the last 20 minutes of the second half, where we got the ball down and started to create some openings
“If you look towards the end of the game we had chances from Marcus Harness, Matty Palmer and Alex MacDonald so we had chances to win the game. Dean Lyness kept us in the game with some fantastic saes, so it was a hard earned point.
“Another point takes us to 72 points and the play-offs are guaranteed, so we can’t be too disappointed,” he said.
The Brewers were left with an uphill task on their hands after conceding after five minutes, but Rowett was pleased with the response of the team as he praised the opposition.
“We bounced back well after the goal and we didn’t really have much choice. We struggled initially and we showed some clips to the players at half-time. We knew what they would do but sometimes knowing what to do and dealing with it are different things.
“They showed two sides of the game today where they were very physical in the first half, but then in the second half they started to pass the ball quite well until we got to grips with it.
“I’m pleased with a point, it was hard earned and we only conceded one goal which adds to our defensive qualities, and we couldn’t quite get that goal to win the game,” Rowett said.
Rowett made six changes from the team that beat Hartlepool United o Saturday, and the Brewers boss was pleased with the efforts of the players that came in.
“Playing on Saturday didn’t help, and it’s why I made so many changes and I felt we coped well with those changes and I was pleased with some of the lads who came in. We have to give credit to Newport and at times during the game spells they looked really good.
“It gives them a taste of action. Jimmy’s been carried off so he might not feature in the next two games depending on the injury, so it will need one or two players to be ready to come into the team and not have to catch up with match action.
“I felt today was an opportunity to freshen the side up, and to give one or two players a chance to stake a claim.”