Alex Pearce praised Derby County’s attitude as they edged a ‘tricky’ meeting with Grimsby Town to reach the Second Round of the Carabao Cup on Tuesday night.
The 28-year-old Republic of Ireland international, who wore the captain’s armband, was one of 10 changes Gary Rowett made to his starting XI from the one that defeated Bolton Wanderers 2-1 at the weekend.
Matej Vydra, the only player to retain his place in the starting line-up, scored the winning goal eight minutes after the interval as the Rams claimed a 1-0 win at Blundell Park to set up a Second-Round meeting with Barnsley next month at Oakwell.
Pearce, the defender, admitted that the Rams could have played better on the night, but insisted the players had to be right mentally ahead of kick-off – something he feels was on display from the first whistle.
He told RamsTV: “It was a case of job done.
“We know ourselves that we need to play better than that but it is job done and these games can be very tricky.
“Fair play to Grimsby, they made it really difficult and a really tough game for us but I thought that we played some decent stuff in the second half and managed to score when we were playing well.
“Thankfully the goal was enough.
“I think that attitude is the main attribute that we need to have and that needed to be right throughout tonight’s game.
“We could have been better on the ball at times but these games can be tricky affairs sometimes and it was about getting the job done to be in the hat for the next round.
“A lot of the boys who came in hadn’t played for a while so I think it is credit them for getting through the game and winning it.
“As always, there is room for improvement. We can be pleased with the way that we applied ourselves, particularly in the second half.”
Rowett used the fixture to give players, who have been on the fringes of the starting places in recent weeks, valuable match minutes.
That meant a whole new back five was fielded against Grimsby, but that didn’t cause any issues as the Rams produced a solid display to record a second clean sheet in three games.
On that, Pearce added: “We played some good stuff in the first 20 minutes of the second half and we saw the game out well which was pleasing.
“As a defender, we are always pleased to get a clean sheet. Fair play to Johnny Mitchell as well, in the second half he made a very good save.
“I think the whole team worked hard tonight and we had a decent enough game to limit them to fairly few chances.”