JOHN ASKEY praised a “battling performance” from his York City side against Maidenhead United, detailing that he was “really pleased” with the showing.

York picked up their first win on the road in the Vanarama National League season on Saturday, beating Maidenhead 1-0 at York Road.

A Maxim Kouogun header proved the difference as City picked up three points after an impressive display, both in attack and defence.

“It’s not an easy place to come, Maidenhead,” reflected York boss Askey.

“It was a really battling performance, I thought the first half was a really good performance and we went into half-time with a deserved lead.

“I think the only downside was that we don’t make enough of our chances. When we get into good positions, we’ve got to create a little bit more and start putting them away, we can’t just rely on set pieces. 

“(There were) a lot of positives, I thought everybody gave their all against a strong team. It was important that we won today.

“In games like that, when it’s 1-0, it can quickly change. If they just happened to sneak (a goal), it could have gone the other way. 

“We looked in control for the majority of the game, if they were going to score it was going to be from a long throw or a set piece. 

“I was really pleased, we’ve obviously had to make changes and change the way that we play, and the players adapted really well.”

The Minstermen lined up with a back-five against the Magipes, rather than Askey's favoured 4-3-3 formation.

As well as longer-term injuries to Paddy McLaughlin and Gus Mafuta, York are also without Michael Duckworth, Luke James, Alex Whittle and captain Lenell John-Lewis.

“A bit of it was the personnel that we’ve got, and a lot of it was because of, we thought against Maidstone that we needed to play two up front to stop their two centre-backs just playing balls up front,” noted Askey.

“It worked well, I thought the two wing-backs did well, Hancox and Fallowfield. We’ve been preparing for that, so that we’re able to change systems, and luckily today it worked.”

“What you saw today is what we’ve got. Manny (Duku) came on, he’s had COVID, he came on and he wasn’t 100 per cent but he did okay, gave us that little bit of height. 

“We’ll have to see if anyone else is fit (for Oldham), but it’s unlikely.”