Ford delighted to see Puritans make it three wins on the spin

The Puritans beat AFC Rushden & Diamonds 2-1 in Saturday's BetVictor Southern League clash at the Banbury Plant Hire Community Stadium.

First half goals from skipper Ricky Johnson and Ravi Shamsi's ninth - and arguably his best - of the season gave the Puritans a 2-0 first half lead. Former Puritan Nabil Shariff was dismissed just before the break to leave the visitors up against it. But, after Tom Lorraine's spot-kick was superbly saved by Jack Harding, substitute Joel Gyasi reduced the arrears late on to set up a tense finish.

Ford said: "We didn't drop points but we have to deal with that situation better in the future because there will be a next time. We turned up to get three points and we did.

"In the first half they couldn't cope with the way we played, we were untroubled apart from their long throws and set-pieces. We scored two excellent goals, you would like to go on and win it 3-0 or 4-0 but I think at halftime the players felt the game was finished, done and dusted. We won it in the end and that's another three important points.

"We beat Stourbridge - a difficult game, Needham Market - even more difficult than when the original fixture should have been played, and now we've beaten a play-off chasing club - all three very good teams. But our mentality in the second half of how we went about trying to win the game wasn't great and we need to learn from that."

Diamonds boss Andy Peaks praised his side's second half display after they almost snatched a late point.

Peaks said: "I was delighted with our second half performance. Ten against a good 11 was always going to be hard but they never stopped trying and worked very hard.

"Banbury have got some good attacking players and you can easily get turned over, but the players listened to the instructions, stuck to the game plan, and it was nearly perfectly executed.

"We kept a good shape in the second half and restricted Banbury to limited opportunities, I think they were glad to hear the final whistle at the end. I was pleased with the second half and playing like that we'll pick up points sooner rather than later.

"I wasn't too disappointed with our first half display, up until the first goal we had the better chances even though Banbury had more possession, their keeper has made two good saves from two set-pieces. But they score the first from a superb delivery and then a second goal which you'd watch over and over again on the television, we should have closed him down but at this level you don't see many goals like that.

"The sending-off made it very difficult for us in the second half, Nabil [Shariff] made it an easy decision for the referee. I didn't think the referee had a great game, he didn't give us a lot, not even the penalty!"