Callum O’Hare believes it was a “massive” win for the Sky Blues after they defeated Portsmouth to move up to third place in the Sky Bet League One table on Tuesday night.
O’Hare assisted substitute Matty Godden for the winning goal on 84 minutes, lifting a superb ball over the Pompey defence for Godden to poke home.
The win extends City’s unbeaten run to nine matches in the league and O’Hare believes it was a deserved three points for Mark Robins side.
O’Hare said: “The way they play, they made it quite nasty for us, it was hard for us to play our usual stuff, which is credit to them, but I thought we still dominated and definitely deserved the win and it’s a massive win.
“I thought we had to get our shots away early because they were coming on to us and we just needed one more chance in the second half and we got it and it was a great finish from Godders.
“The gaffer told me to come away from throw-ins because it was going down the line most of the time.
“The ball went out, I was looking away, and all I heard was Cal! Frank threw it to me, I looked up and reacted quickly, saw Godders’ movement and just dinked it over to him and he’s turned around and it was a great finish.”
The midfielder was sporting a plaster around his head on Tuesday night, following a head collision against Bolton Wanderers at the weekend.
Despite requiring 10 stitches, O’Hare was determined to play in what he felt was one of City’s biggest games of the season.
“The ball was in the air, I checked over my shoulder and I saw the defender drop off, I’m just watching the ball, I’ve headed it and then bang!
“It didn’t really hurt that much, but my whole arm was covered in blood and it was squirting out.
“Then I felt my head and I had a massive dent in it, and I was thinking ‘my head has fallen off here’.
“When I looked in the mirror, I thought it was going to be a lot worse, the doctor and Paul did a great job stitching me back up so it’s not as bad as it could have been.
“I wasn’t in pain once it was strapped up, just let me play on and carry on and tonight was one of the biggest games of the season so there was no way that I wasn’t going to play tonight.”
Having played opposition at both the top and bottom end of the League One table in their last two fixtures, O’Hare admits City just have to focus on themselves rather than where their opposition are in the table.
“The defence have been really, really good all season, the clean sheet was massive tonight and will do us the world of good.
“We just focus on ourselves, our next game, whatever it may be, is the biggest game of the season now, we need to win every game and then we’ll be where we should be.
“We can’t think about where anyone else is in the table, we just have to focus on ourselves and get the three points.”
With City flying high in the table, the 21-year-old is happy to be contributing to the Sky Blues success and believes he is developing nicely as a player following his arrival on loan from Aston Villa in the summer.
“It’s been a great season for the club and I’m happy to be contributing here and showing what I can do.
“We’ve got a really good chance of going up, look where we are in the table, we’ve just got to hope we can keep performing until the end of the season.
“I feel like I’m developing nicely as a player, I’m getting stronger and I’m much more positionally aware than I was when I first arrived here.
“Aston Villa have told me to just keep doing what I’m doing, keep getting games, keep playing well and keep trying to get goals and assists and see what happens.
“I didn’t sleep for a week after the Birmingham match, I was thinking about celebrating and completely took my eye off the ball, you’ve got to score them, but I’m over that now.”