Adams: Win the most important thing
Match-winner Ché Adams hailed the result over the performance as Southampton reached the Carabao Cup quarter-finals with a narrow 2-1 win over Lincoln at St Mary’s
The striker scored either side of the break to cancel out Gavin Bazunu’s unfortunate early own goal, as the League One opponents proved to be tricky opposition.
Moving into the final eight, Adams reflected on Saints’ first match since the middle of November.
“Mixed feelings,” he said. “It should have been way more comfortable than it was. Me and Sam [Edozie] had the chances and we need to be more clinical.
“In the Premier League you don’t get those chances come around often. We got a win today and that was the most important thing. A new manager, back at St Mary’s, we needed to get the win and build back into Brighton in the Premier League on Boxing Day.
“We knew they were going to come and make it hard for us and they did that in the first couple of minutes, but everyone came together and we put a big shift in. As the manager said, they’re going to make it hard for us and we just had to put things right in the second half.”
Reflecting on Nathan Jones’s first five weeks as manager, Adams commented on a positive feeling around the squad.
“Been a breath of fresh air. New ideas, new faces around the training ground but everyone is looking forward to it and the manager has implemented what he wants to do. Everybody could see today, we had bodies in the box and created chances, and it’s just up to us to put the ball in the net and get wins.
“It’s hard to win football games and in the Premier League it’s not easy, so it was important for the manager to get his first win at St Mary’s and for us, we need to build back into the Premier League and we know it’s going to be hard, but we need to get wins sooner rather than later.”