Paul Phillips satisfied with Matlock Town's FA Trophy win over Marske United

Matlock ran out 3-2 winners at the Proctor Cars Stadium on Tuesday night.

Marske had knocked both South Shields and National League North Chester out of the FA Cup and had also eliminated FC United of Manchester from the FA Trophy, all higher placed in the pyramid.

The Gladiators made the tie more difficult than it should have been on the night, conceding headers to Matty Tymon early and late in the game.

Phillips said: “We seem to make a habit of making things more difficult for ourselves, we did it against Rushden in an earlier round.

"For 70 minutes we were dominant, even when they scored early in the game. Our tempo was good and we could have scored a couple more than the two we got in the first half.

" Late on Marske threw the kitchen sink at us but we stood up to it and on the whole I think we deserved to win by more.”

Phillips was frustrated by the way the two goals were conceded.

“We can’t carry on conceding two poor goals like that, it’s not in our DNA and it ’s something I and the players will have to sort,” he added.

“Also I thought we gave the ball away too easily near the end, we’ve got to manage games better.”

But looking at the bigger picture Phillips says the win in a cup competition is all important.

He said: “The biggest thing is to get through, the game was a great advert for non league football in the first half. It was important for everyone at the club to win the game, now we’ve got a good game with York to look forward to, but we’ll look at that after we’ve got the two important league games out of the way.

"One other point is that we‘ve got to do things in the right manner if we’re to go on and progress in the league and cup games, better sides will punish us.”

Not for the first time this season, Alex Byrne put in a man of the match performance with a brace of goals and an assist.

“He was brilliant, we know what he can do and he can put in those types of performances when he simplifies his game. He was immense in the first half and you also have to admire his workrate,” Phillips added.