Ward: Survival spirit secured safety

Ward, who took charge at the Nanpantan Sports Ground in December, heaped praise on his side on Monday for winning their last four matches of the season to collect the maximum points they needed to stay in EVO-STIK NPL First Division South for the 2017-18 season.

Dynamo beat Market Drayton Town 4-1 on Saturday's final day and Ward, pictured, said: "I cannot praise my players attitude and belief on the run-in highly enough. Our wins at Rugby Town and Northwich Victoria before Easter were the turning points.

"We played well at Gresley on Easter Monday. I felt we were the better side but I didn't think we were going to get the win we deserved, but we kept at it and got that late winner.

"When I took over just after Christmas we reviewed our upcoming games. We only had five home league games in February, March and April. I always felt we had a chance of staying up, and I thought things may well go to the last day of the season. In some games we didn't quite get the rub of the green, in others I thought we weren't good enough.

"We struggled for the first thirty minutes against Market Drayton Town. I think it may well have been due to a combination of nerves and Market Drayton playing well. We went a goal down, but equalised quickly, which I think made quite a difference. When we scored our second goal just after half time I thought we could push on from there, which we did.

Ward, who left Kidsgrove Athletic in September after their poor start to the campaign, added: "We were getting updates from Rugby, so we really went through a rollercoaster of emotions on the bench! But we have competitiveness in the side and this certainly showed in the final few games of the season."

Image courtesy of stokesentinel.co.uk

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