Fraser hails character of the team
Fresh from scoring his second stoppage-time winner in the space of a fortnight, Ryan Fraser praised Saints’ character after they moved seven unbeaten with a 1-0 win at Millwall.
The midfielder was introduced as a second half substitute and, as he did at Hull last month, produced a 93rd minute strike to earn all three points for Russell Martin’s side after a dominant second half performance.
Speaking after a second euphoric moment in as many weeks, Fraser said: “We are leaving it late, but I think that just shows the character of the team again.
“Just the fans from minute one cheering us on and 20 minutes after the full time whistle went they’re still cheering with the boys who have come on and are doing running after the game, so that was for them.
“I think the game in the first half was tough, they made it really difficult for us. It was really narrow, we obviously like to play through the thirds and in the middle a little bit more, but this is how good Russell Martin is as a manager. He got the boys in at half time and he told us a way to get around that and the change from that half time teamtalk, to have that dominance in the second half is so hard. I think he just gave us that little structure change and that’s what happens and we’ve managed to get that goal at the end and celebrate with the fans again and just amazing feelings.
“I’ve got to say this team is so together, we’re just so close. When we’re around the building together everyone says ‘morning’, small stuff like that might sound silly but I think togetherness is massive in this league and for any team to strive to where we want to go to it’s huge.
“We’re all together and we all believe in ourselves, the manager believes, we all believe in the staff that as a team the whole club can come together and be where we want to be and moments like today, it’s one percent to where want to be and now it’s take the confidence, that’s this behind ticked off and we go into next week and we want to give the fans something to cheer about again, hopefully not so late, but maybe a two, three nil would be nice.”
Keeping a clean sheet for just the second time this season, Fraser also hailed the importance of Saints’ rearguard action.
“The club’s that I’ve been at, the managers I’ve had and Russell himself, that’s the base of any good team, to have that cleansheet to go on and not have to score two goals to win a game is huge.
“The defenders have probably deserved more cleansheets than they’ve got in the last seven, eight games but now we’re starting to come together and I don’t know if keeping the same team a lot in the last seven, eight games [has helped] and that’s probably a good thing for the manager to do as it forms relationships and in any good team you need those relationships.”