King’s Lynn Town manager James Rowe praised two-goal hero Ross Crane after he fired the Linnets to their first National League North win of the season.
Crane struck twice inside the opening 30 minutes to secure a 2-0 success and three points following last week’s opening-day draw against AFC Telford United.
The former Ipswich man broke the deadlock with a well-timed header from a Bailey Clements cross that looped over ex-Lynn goalkeeper Theo Richardson.
He doubled his tally soon after, reacting quickest to sweep the ball home after Reece Hall-Johnson’s strike rattled the woodwork.
Rowe was full of admiration for the 22-year-old’s contribution.
“It’s been a lot of work in the last seven weeks, more from himself,” the Linnets boss.
“He’s got to control his own development. But we were right by his side, and he showed ability there.
“Dangerous from distance, ran his heart out. His running stats were through the roof, high intensity was through the roof, and that allowed him the space in the pockets. We knew that would open up on transition if we invited them on.
“We could hit them on the break, which we did well. To take the game plan into practice, where he scored, he’s come in between the centre-half and the full-back and scored a header in the early stages – it’s exactly what we worked on in training, exactly what we talked about on the video. He’s produced, so that’s the mark of a good player.”
The result leaves Lynn unbeaten with four points from their opening two games ahead of Tuesday night’s trip to Spennymoor.
“It feels really good in the changing room,” he said.
“We’ve got a great togetherness. I just said in there to the players that the most important ones were the ones that weren’t involved, that perhaps thought they should have been involved.
“We had two that travelled that were in the stands. We had two that didn’t come on in Gold (Omotayo) and Theo (Williams), and obviously Jonah (Paul Jones) as well. And Gold could have thought that he was hard done by not being in the starting XI.
“But that’s what we need to do. We need to play in different ways. We played completely differently today than we did last week.
“It was about the space, and we certainly dominated the space, and we were deserved winners.”
Hereford: Richardson, Skinner, Quansah, Preston, Howkins (Roberts 46), D’Ath (K. Williams 79), Richards, Osbourne (A. Williams 79), Sterling-James, Nto (Edwards 65), Campbell (Wreh 65). Subs not used: Lewis, Hudson.
Booked: D’Ath
King’s Lynn Town: Chadwick, Hall-Johnson, Clements, Wilson, Clunan, Collins (Forde-Brown 71), Nyahwema (Dickens 81), Gyasi (Marriott 76), Fleming, Crane, Maja (M. Williams 52). Subs not used: Omotayo, T. Williams, Jones.
Booked: Maja, Wilson, Crane.
Scorer: Crane 5, 28.
Attendance: 2,854.
