City's Stansfield up for a fight

By sjames stuart james at st james' park

EXETER City striker Adam Stansfield will do everything it takes to ensure that the Grecians are playing Coca-Cola League One football next season.

The striker turned in a man-of-the- match display as the Devon side recorded a 1-0 win over Southend United last Saturday, with Stansfield scoring the only goal of the game.

The win halted a run of four successive League and cup defeats for the Grecians and moved them up to 18th in the table, five points clear of the relegation zone. This season was always going to be one where City had a fight to avoid the drop on their hands and, now he is in League One, Stansfield is desperate to stay there.

"It was a massive win," he said. "Coming off the back of four defeats, we were starting to push towards the wrong end of the league and, if we had put in a bad performance, we could have been in the drop zone. The gaffer asked for a big performance and every player responded, even when we were down to ten men, and we have come out with a massive win.

"We really needed the points to pull away from the drop zone, especially when you have hard games against the likes of Southampton and Leeds coming up. It is good to be able to win ugly sometimes, it's important to have those things in your locker.

"We have worked so hard to get to where we are and no one wants that disappointment of relegation. I certainly don't want it in my career and I will personally do all I can not to get a relegation. Everyone will work their hardest to make sure we are not in that position."

The rewards for Exeter working so hard to get to where they are include considerably more attractive fixtures than they have had before. On Boxing Day, they travel to former Premier League giants Southampton, and Stansfield can't wait to run out at their plush St Mary's Stadium.

"They are on a great run at the minute, but we will go into it trying our best," the striker added. "It's a far cry from playing at Histon and Farsley Celtic a few years ago, and these are the rewards that every player has deserved with the back-to-back promotions. We just want to stay in this league.

"A couple of wins and we will be right back up there. We can only take one game at a time and we will look to take that performance into Boxing Day. It will be tough playing there but, if we can put in the kind of spirit and everyone chases every ball and rat around like we did against Southend, then we will come away with something."

Manager Paul Tisdale will be forced to change a winning side for his return to Southampton, though, as Barry Corr is suspended following his red card. It was the Irishman's second red card of the season, and his second for lashing out at an opponent off the ball. However, Stansfield has some sympathy for his strike partner.

"It was an off the ball incident, I didn't see it properly, but the referee must have seen something," he added. "I don't think he would have sent him off for nothing.

"Sometimes you see the red mist and it happens in the game when you are determined to win like he is. The red mist takes over and you do silly things, I'm sure he will regret it, but I am sure he will be back."

Stansfield is in a good run of form himself, and his goal on Saturday was his sixth of the season so far. He could have made it two after missing a good chance late on, but it was his all round performance that really caught the eye.

Speaking about his goal, the striker said: "I'm used to the long ball from Troy after the goal at MK Dons! It is my job to be on the shoulder and be clever and look to latch on to those long balls. The goalkeeper was on the edge of his area and back-pedalling, I just tried to lift it over him and it has gone in.

"I could have had a second one, but I was struggling to get my legs to work, let alone put the ball in the net! I had tired legs and the ball just got stuck under my feet. By then I was having a couple of looks over to the bench to see if there was anyone getting stripped off, but Fleets [Stuart Fleetwood] and Logie [Richard Logan] were sat down with their arms folded!"