Harrogate Town enjoy comfortable romp over Mansfield Town to delight boss Simon Weaver

A sixth goal of the season for midfielder Alex Pattison followed by striker Luke Armstrong’s brace – all scored in the first half – saw the Sulphurites extend their proud undefeated record against the Stags to a sixth contest, including five wins and one draw.

Weaver was particularly impressed with how Harrogate coped with Mansfield’s considerable aerial threat – an area in which his side have struggled this term.

He said: “I’m really proud of the performance. Everybody was on it.

“We were good out of possession and, when we had the ball, we worried Mansfield and were clinical. It was probably our best performance of the season, but it has been coming.

“We’ve not had the rub of the green recently, but we still needed to improve in key elements of the game in terms of defending our box better and we did that, so everybody should take confidence from the performance. We saw their line-up and knew they had gone as big and physical as they possibly could.

“But, despite their height advantage, we defended their set-pieces really well and we also got the ball down well on a greasy surface and caused problems.

“We are good on the break but can also pass the ball and we are creating plenty of chances now.”

Mansfield manager Nigel Clough was fuming with his team’s display and admitted he selected the wrong starting XI.