REACTION | Robinson hails 'outstanding' second-half performance in Bristol Rovers win

George Jones reports from The Valley

Karl Robinson hailed his players after they put in an ‘outstanding’ second-half performance in Monday’s 4-1 victory over Bristol Rovers at The Valley.

The Addicks, behind through Jermaine Easter’s 12th-minute opener, went in level at the break after Josh Magennis nodded his side on terms.

The big striker bagged two more goals in the second period to complete his treble – with Jorge Teixeira also notching – and afterwards the Manager was full of praise for his side.

“It was the first time for a while that I have seen us dominate possession for long periods of time,” he said. “And every time we lost it, we ran and got it back.

“Their goal came against the run of play, for me, and we got back in it and second half - considering it was our second game in three days – our performance was outstanding.

“Once they scored, there was a 15-minute period when there were a few rumbles behind me; it took bravery and bottle to keep playing our way. That’s what we did.

“We came back and every single one of them was outstanding. It was brave to play two young players in the centre of midfield but I thought Ezri and Joe were on another planet today.

“They are as good as I have seen for a long time. I’m really excited about working with them and they can help to drag this club back to where it belongs.”

Robinson was also delighted for hat-trick hero Magennis, who netted the first treble of his career. 

He said: “What people may not have seen is that in the second half he ran back 70 yards with their midfield player and made a tackle.

“He looked dead on his feet, I was going to take him off but he looked at me and said ‘don’t you dare!’ He wanted the applause and it was also important at the end of the game for the players to split and applaud different parts of the stadium.

“It’s a bit harder here, with the tunnel in the corner, for the players to almost do a lap and a half to see everyone, so we decided to split everybody and finish in front of the goal.

“I hope that the fans appreciated the support of the players and I certainly think it was backed up by a wonderful, clinical performance.”

The Addicks now face 12 days until their next match. He hopes to have a few more players available to him by then.

He said: “Declan Rudd and Ricky Holmes may be back for the next game – and I hope that we could have two new players in the door by then too – so we welcome the break.   

“We’re hoping to get something done sooner rather than later but we can’t put a time frame onto it.

“We still need to improve in some areas and what was important today was that we didn’t shoehorn things. I made some brave decisions in that I didn’t want to play people in positions that weren’t natural to them.

“Apart from maybe Adam Chicksen, everyone played in their natural position and I thought Crofty was outstanding as an enforcer.

“The two boys in front of him were brilliant. Patrick made the error but to come back the way he did showed tremendous determination.

“Sols was a machine, considering he’s not played for seven weeks, and there are exciting times ahead if we can bring a couple more players in.”