Players quickly took on board the tactical changes needed to get a result at St. James' Park last night.

Crewe Alexandra boss David Artell his ‘side gave as good as they got’ against a tough Exeter City side last night. A Michael Nottingham equaliser just after the hour mark saw us leave St. James Park with a deserved point and the result kept us in second place.

Afterwards, the Alex boss said he was delighted with the character shown by his players to come back from a goal down at half-time and make sure we were not beaten.

The Alex boss told crewealex.net: “A point was fair and I thought we gave as good as we got against a very good side. We had to amend our style of play in the second half because in the first half, we were trying to play through the lines, against their high line on a poor pitch.

“All the space was in behind and we had to play more direct. We had our top three right up there and we played more up the pitch, so even if things broke down or hit a bobble then at least it was further from our goal.

“We played in the right areas of the pitch in the second half and deserved the point.

The boss added: “I’m sure it would have been a better spectacle on a better pitch because Exeter would much prefer to play some football but when you have two teams going toe-to-toe but not giving much away that leads to an interesting contest a well.”