Northampton boss Jon Brady hailed his side’s “outstanding” performance and said a point was the very least they deserved after Tuesday’s dramatic 2-2 draw against Lincoln at Sixfields.
Reeco Hackett-Fairchild’s sweet first-half finish was added to by a Paudie O’Connor header as Lincoln moved into a 2-0 lead, but both goals came very much against the run of play.
Northampton dominated the majority of the game but had to wait until the final few minutes to get their rewards as Louis Appere levelled on 86 minutes before Sam Hoskins salvaged a deserved point deep into stoppage time.
“It’s a bit bittersweet because I felt we deserved to win the game,” said Brady. “But if you don’t defend your box right you’ll concede goals, and unfortunately we didn’t.
“The second goal was potentially offside, I’ll have to watch to back, but to play the way we played and to have the patience and dominate all the stats, it’s very pleasing.
“We had 19 shots to their six and we kept being patient even when a few fans were moaning and wanted us to go long. The boys stuck to our beliefs and kept playing the way we want to play. It was really good.
“We got into a lot of crossing positions, we hit the post, we have shots cleared off the line, and how the challenge on Kieron Bowie isn’t a penalty, I don’t know. He rolls the defender, he has the goal open to drive at and the defender lands on top of him.
“For some reason it’s not given, but that doesn’t take away from a spirited performance. I thought we were outstanding.”
Lincoln manager Mark Kennedy said: “I’m gutted, absolutely gutted. But you have to take the emotion away from the game and look at the bigger picture.
“You’re 15 seconds from being euphoric, seeing plenty of high-fives and back-slapping and what would have been an amazing start to the season, but when I get away from that I think it’s a good point on the road.
“Without sounding silly, it’s a good point after a good win at the weekend. We’ve had a tough start to the season with a lot of away games but to be honest I was really impressed with them tonight, really impressed.
“I’ve seen their previous games and they’ve actually played very well but haven’t come out on the right side of the results so good luck to them. Jon will say he deserved a point and I probably can’t argue with him.
“I thought we were very good with how we dealt with their pressure and I thought we looked dangerous on the counter-attack and we were very clinical.”
