Greg Draper’s second half penalty helps The New Saints to victory over Barry Town to end their home unbeaten record.
TNS Striker Greg Draper was “relieved” to see his team get back to winning ways and move back top of the Welsh Premier League.
Goals from Draper and Joash Nembhard helped TNS on their way to a 2-0 victory over Barry Town United at Jenner Park.
Draper’s goal was his 12th of the season moving him alongside Steven Tamas of Bala Town in the goalscoring charts but started the game on the substitutes bench.
“Relieved, more than anything, to go three game games without winning not something that happens too often at TNS, we are under a lot of pressure today really, especially coming to a place like this where Barry have a great home record and doing really well in the league.”
“We expected a tough game, we got a tough game and it was just nice for us to put on a good performance and get that result.”
“You got to take every chance you can, you are frustrated if you are not starting. Before today I started four or five games in a row, but I haven’t scored in the last couple so you mix things today.”
“You need to keep calm and not let your frustration get the better of you otherwise you won’t do a good enough job.”
The New Zealand international came off the bench moments before Mo Touray was sent off for Barry giving away a penalty which was scored by the one-time capped international.
“Whenever I get a penalty, I am always confident, you’ve always got a high chance of scoring as long as you do what you plan to do and don’t change your mind at the last second, you’ve always got a good chance.”
“I got a good strike on it and he (Mike Lewis) got a good hand on it to be fair but it was just a bit too much power so luckily it went in.”
The New Saints now go to Cambrian and Clydach in the first Nathaniel MG Cup Semi Final on Friday.
“It’s always pressure on us, playing a team from the league below, in the last two games of the League Cup this season.” He said. “The manager’s mixed up the team and giving the lads who haven’t played that much some minutes, I’m sure he will do the same again.
Nembhard scored the second goal for the away side in three second half minutes from an Adrian Cieślewicz corner to end Barry Town’s record of not losing at home since the 13th January and the twenty-nine-year-old stresses that they keep their momentum going.
“It’s something we work on a lot to be fair, we work on our set pieces defensively and attacking, whenever we score from a set piece it is always nice.”
“The centre halves enjoy scoring that they don’t get to score so much he’s (Nembhard) still going on about it on the bus.”
“It’s important that we do everything right and perform like we did today and hopefully we shouldn’t have any worries if we do that.”
“It’s just important that we back up now, there’s no use putting in a performance like that and getting three points here, if we go in two weeks’ time when we play Cardiff Met and we can’t back up with another three points, otherwise tonight would have been a waste.”
“We just got to move on now, it’s three points and we’ve got a long way to go, so we’ve got make sure that keep putting in performances like that week in week out.”
