Crewe Alexandra boss David Artell believes he was able to implement a flexible 4-4-2 formation against Accrington Stanley because ‘he has coachable players’. Artell went with the experienced Chris Porter in a new striking partnership with Mikael Mandron and it paid off with Crewe winning 2-0 and Porter notching home the decisive second goal.

Crewe had enough chances to have killed the game earlier than the final 10 minutes and secure our first win following back-to-back defeats to Peterborough and Swindon.

Artell told the club’s official website: “Make no bones about it, Accrington are one of the best side’s in League One and they are not used to losing. I thought we thoroughly deserved the win, as we were the better team in both halves.

“We did a lot of work on playing differently. We said to the players over the last couple of weeks that if we need to change and play a different way, going forward, then this may be it. 

"They picked it up really well because they haven’t been asked to play that system for a long time. They were very good at it.

“We go on about having coachable players and we feel we have them. When you do they pick up what you are trying to teach them and they did that. They deserve the credit.”