Edinburgh hails gritty Newport

Justin Edinburgh praised his Newport side's resolve as they maintained their promotion push with a 1-0 win at Cheltenham.

Chris Zebroski returned to haunt his former club with the winning goal in the 11th minute, but the Exiles were forced to soak up considerable pressure. "We rode our luck slightly in the first half but we were resilient in the second half and you've got to be to come away from home to keep clean sheets," Edinburgh said. "If you do that you always have a chance of wining the game. The goal that won it was a great finish. "You're not always going to be able to play free-flowing football away from home but the way we defended and the work rate was immense. "We got a grip of their system in the first half and we were good second half. "I thought we retained the ball better, had a better shape and a better understanding. We were a little loose in possession first half and especially being way from home we did a lot of chasing, unnecessarily. "But our defending, our blocks, our tackles and that desire to keep a clean sheet and with Jamie Stephens in he form he is in, it was going to be hard to break us down. "You certainly need to be able to hold on to leads and defend how we asked them to do." Cheltenham were inches away from opening the scoring in the third minute when Terry Gornell's shot hit the inside of the right post. Newport took the lead in the 11th minute when Zebroski was allowed to turn on the edge of the box after receiving Adam Chapman's pass and his shot nestled in the bottom right corner. Ismail Yakubu's header was nodded off the line by Matt Richards in the 56th minute as Newport nearly made it 2-0, but one goal was enough. Cheltenham boss Paul Buckle was left perplexed as to how his side finished the match empty handed. "I am absolutely gutted because I thought we were very good considering we lost two players from the last game," Buckle said. "I was disappointed with the goal, which was struck from distance. Prior to that how the ball didn't go in the net for us I will never know. "This was a totally different Cheltenham team and totally different to what I took over. I am proud of them. "I am gutted we didn't get at least a point against a team fifth in the league. "Sometimes when you get beaten, people just look at the score, but I took over something that was pretty wounded. "The boys who came into the side I was thrilled with, there were huge pluses all over the field. "I felt we should have had a penalty because their lad came in from behind and Harry was in on goal. There were six bookings, which showed we got away from them."