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Edinburgh hails Newport spirit

Image: Justin Edinburgh: Delighted with unbeaten run

Justin Edinburgh praised Newport's belief after they made it seven league games unbeaten with an entertaining 3-2 win at Carlisle.

Yan Klukowski glanced his header from a superb Chris Zebroski past Carlisle goalkeeper Dan Hanford to open the scoring before Ismail Yakubu fired in from a yard out. Carlisle responded quickly as Brad Potts fired home only for Newport substitute Shaun Jeffers to secure all three points in added time before David Amoo's consolation. Edinburgh said: "The work ethic of this team is excellent and anyone watching can see how much they are prepared to fight for each other. "Anyone who has been in football knows if you've got that camaraderie and togetherness, you give yourself a much better chance of success. "That showed and although the scoreline was tight, I thought we looked a lot more comfortable and could have won by a bigger margin." Edinburgh said the call to pick Jamie Stephens in goal over Lenny Pidgeley following Joe Day's departure had been a difficult one, but was pleased with the contribution he made to the win. He admitted: "I had a few sleepless nights about the goalkeeper decision. It was a really tough call but I went with Jamie over Lenny because he's had a bit more game time recently with his loan spell at Gloucester. "I felt that gave him the edge and I'm really pleased for him as he made some vital saves at key moments in the game when Carlisle were applying good pressure." Carlisle manager Keith Curle bemoaned his side's poor defending and admitted that they need to improve quickly to get out of the relegation battle. He said: "I'm bitterly disappointed with the result. We're in a relegation battle and need to stop gifting sides easy goals. "The most frustrating thing is they did the ugly side of the game better than us. They were big, physical and played with real conviction. "Even at 2-0 down I thought we'd get a couple of goals but we conceded another sloppy goal and we can't keep doing that. We need to improve quickly but I believe there's enough in the dressing room to get us away from trouble."

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