New year cheer for Valiants with thumping victory

PORT Vale recorded a remarkable win as they got to grips with life without Darren Moore.

- CLIVE YOULTON

VALE’S players had produced the good, the bad and the ugly in the season thus far and midfielder Jordan Shipley said he and his team-mates had accepted the blame for Darren Moore's sacking.

The former Coventry City player was another who had hardly been involved.

Speaking after the 1-0 reverse at Bradford City, Shipley told Port Vale TV: “Obviously it’s never good when someone loses their job and the boys will take most of the blame for that as well.

“We have got to regroup now and we showed it out there, we have got to stick together. We're in it together and it's only us that’s going to change this and hopefully results start changing for us and we can start climbing [the table].

“There's loads of football to be played. We have just got to start grinding out results now. Hopefully two or three on the bounce and we can see what we can do”

It wasn’t particularly realistic to think a team that had only won three of their 22 games thus far could go on a run but the intention was there.

Meanwhile, Vale legend and ex-manager Martin Foyle believed club owner Carol Shanahan OBE had been “protecting” Darren Moore as long as she could before the decision to sack him.