Jimmy Marshall raves as ‘fantastic’ Lancaster City end away hoodoo

The Dolly Blues took the lead after a minute through Simon Grand, and then doubled that advantage 20 seconds into the second half via Nic Evangelinos. 

Bobby Bjork and Steven Yawson added extra gloss to a big victory for the Dolly Blues, who ended the weekend four points adrift of the play-offs.

Cables are well-known for being hard to beat at Valerie Park, this being just their fourth loss of the campaign at home, and the Lancaster boss credited how his men handled the challenge.

“It’s a tough place to come. They’re notoriously good at home, so to come here and win 4-0 is fantastic,” he said post-match.

“We did a lot of the ugly stuff well today, defended our box well and scored at good times. The scoreline may make people think we battered them, but Prescot made it difficult.

“I thought we stood up to the task well.”

It was their first win on the road since November 29 at Stocksbridge Park Steels. Since then, Lancaster had lost four and drawn twice away from home, including a 3-0 defeat to Hednesford Town last time out.

Marshall knew his side needed to react and was impressed with the defensive efforts.

He added: “If we get beat, we get beat, but we need to make sure we respond, and it was a totally different game today. I’m more impressed with the clean sheet - I don’t think we gave up too many chances..

“So I’m pleased with that, it’s another three points to keep adding to that tally and hopefully get safe as soon as possible!”

Marshall’s mindset all season has been to remain in the division. Even earlier in the campaign, when they were top of the table, the Lancaster boss stated on the NPL Show that the main focus was getting enough points to stay at Step 3 for next season.

The Dolly Blues are now just four points off the play-offs though, and could end up sneaking in there come the end of the season.

“We can’t influence what teams around us are doing. But if we get three points, we can look at where we are afterwards.”