Blues boss Roy Keane was delighted with the way his side settled into the Arctic conditions during Saturday’s 3-0 victory over Leicester. The Town manager also had praise for groundsman Alan Ferguson and his staff for making sure the game went ahead and ensuring that it reached its conclusion.
Keane said: "I think we adapted well to it. It was never going to be pretty. Young Shane came back in, Damo was back involved, Chuck played on the right. I think we had a nice bit of energy around the team.
"We sacrificed out and out wingers in Andros and Carlos as I thought we needed more defence-minded players across the midfield four as I think we’ve been very open. I thought all the players adapted well.
"We played to our strengths and adapted to the conditions and scored three good goals. There was good honesty amongst the players, which was reflected particularly in the third goal with Shane not giving up, chasing a lost cause and we got the rewards.”
The Irishman admitted he was concerned when referee Stuart Attwell took the players off in the 59th minute in order than further work was carried out on the pitch: "The fact that we’d scored three goals we were pretty keen for the game to continue. When you go off the pitch you fear for the worst because it wasn’t going to get any better.
"But when we came back out, Alan Ferguson and his groundstaff were pretty busy and working hard for their Christmas boxes! Fergie will be looking for his Christmas box tomorrow! He was going to get a decent one anyway!”
Keane says he wasn’t entirely sure whether the additional break helped to do anything other than heap further pressure on Attwell: "The referee came over and tried to have a conversation with me and Sven but obviously other people were getting their say. He was saying he was going to take us off for 10 minutes to give us a chance to clear the pitch and see what happened from there.
"What the point of that was I don’t know, because it certainly wasn’t going to ease off. But that was the decision he made. The problem was that as soon as we went down the tunnel he was under all sorts of pressure from different people.
"I think it was at its worst with five or 10 minutes to go and he was hardly going to call the game off then.
"Leicester were arguing the case for the game to be off, as you’d expect when they’re 3-0 down. But I understand that, that’s the industry we’re in.”
Like his skipper David Norris, Keane couldn’t recall playing in similar conditions in the past: "I don’t think so, not as bad as that. I don’t think the pitch was too bad. I thought the players were doing OK, both sets of players were trying to pass it. Credit to both sets of players.
"We adapted better, but usually it is the home team that does adapt better for some reason, maybe it was because we’ve not travelled down. Sometimes it creates negative energy when you’re wondering whether the game is off, I’ve had that before as a manager.”