Victory over champions Lincoln City boosts belief that Newport County can claim a place in the League Two play-offs

The equation couldn’t be simpler for County as they enter the final week of the League Two campaign; beat Oldham Athletic at Rodney Parade on Tuesday night and win at Morecambe on Saturday and they will secure a place in the play-offs.

Easier said than done, but the Exiles are thriving under pressure at the business end of the season.

Michael Flynn’s men are now unbeaten in eight games, keeping six clean sheets during that run, making them the form team in the division.

And this hugely impressive win over the champions, eight days after second-placed Bury were dispatched at Rodney Parade, will only boost the belief that they can get over the line.

This was a different sort of victory. Lincoln City weren’t blown away like Bury were on Good Friday.

The Imps had nothing to play for, having clinched the title on Monday, but they certainly didn’t have the deckchairs and flip-flops out on a blustery afternoon in Newport.

They created numerous chances in a dominant first-half display and almost snatched a point at the death when Josh Sheehan was caught dawdling on the ball on the edge of his own box.

But a combination of poor finishing from the visitors and a resolute defensive display by County meant the three points stayed in South Wales.

“We’ve been blunt in the last three games,” admitted Lincoln boss Danny Cowley after the game.

“We’d scored for 28 games consecutively prior to this run.

“People keep telling about consolidating [in League One], but that’s not for me. I’m not interested in that; I haven’t got time to waste in my life. We want to be competitive and we want to go and win football matches.

“If we want to do that in League One, we need to improve in attacking areas, that is for sure.”

Cowley was also upset about the manner of the winning goal, which arrived in the seventh minute when Matty Dolan played a clever ball inside Lincoln right-back Neal Eardley.

Padraig Amond raced onto it and cut the ball back from the byline for the on-rushing Scot Bennett to crash in his shot off the underside of the bar.

“We’ve got to be a lot better,” added the visiting manager. “We’re going into League One now.

“You can’t fault the boys in terms of their work ethic and application at a very difficult ground and in testing conditions.

“But you can’t concede a soft goal like we did. They got into our box three times in the first half and we conceded off one of those.

“They got into our right channel, we didn’t stop the cross and didn’t pick up the midfield runner. There were too many mistakes.

“And we had so many chances, one after the other. It’s very frustrating. In the second half we had three gilt-edged ones, particularly the one at the end [which Shay McCartan put wide]. That summed at our day completely.

“We had so many chances and haven’t been able to take them.”

County are taking their chances when it matters at the moment and they have now reached Flynn’s first target of beating the club’s best points tally since returning to the Football League in 2013.

His side are now on 67 points – two more than the 2015 vintage managed. They ended up ninth that year, Flynn’s last full campaign as a player, and they will be confident of improving on that finish this week.

Whatever happens against Oldham, the fight will go to the final day of the season.

But County know they can take another massive step towards the play-offs with victory over the Latics.

One cup final won, two more to go.

County: Day; Poole, O’Brien, Demetriou; Willmott, Sheehan, Bennett, Dolan, Butler; Kennedy (Azeez, 75), Amond

Subs not used: Pipe, Bakinson, Marsh-Brown, Randall, Azeez, McKirdy

Referee: Paul Marsden

Attendance: 4,605 (788 Lincoln)