Andy Garner so proud as tired Mansfield Town hold on for ‘staggering win’ over rivals

With eight players missing and matchwinner James Gale of with a head injury by the 21st minutes, Stags tired rapidly in the second half but clung on to survive a powerful aerial bombardment from the visitors, who remain top three.

“We've won 1-0 and I would have taken that all day at 3pm. We are so proud of the players with the week they've had and the injuries we've got,” said Garner.

“That win was staggering. The only disappointing thing is we haven't moved anywhere.

“We must be the only team that get six points and don't move anywhere.

“But we can't do much about other results so we will dust ourselves down and get ready to for a nice, little easy game against Orient on Tuesday.”

The six added minutes seemed to last a lifetime and Garner said: “It was hard watching near the end.

“We all want the three points and were just hoping and praying when the ball went into the box we got it cleared.

“It didn't help when Christy Pym got smashed into and they played on. I thought the officials were extremely poor today.

“I don't think they gave us a lot at all and that challenge on Pymy summed it up. It was a blatant foul.

“We all knew it was going to be like that today. It was a massive effort at Newport on Tuesday – a lot went into that result. Then we had to travel back.

“Then we had Stevenage putting it on us in the last 10 minutes and got through it.

“We have had to manage a lot of balls into our box today but the desire, courage and effort to keep that ball out of the net was absolutely fantastic.” He added: “I can't speak highly enough of them and I hope the crowd appreciate it too.

“The lads were on their knees. We had players on the bench who couldn't really go on so all they could do was try.

“If James Gale isn't right for Tuesday then that will be nine injured.

“It is what it is. They will have tomorrow off, be back in Monday and see how they feel and see if we can get some energy back into their bodies.”