Joey Barton believes Bristol Rovers seized a crucial opportunity on Tuesday night and he has backed his side to ride up on the rails and unsettle the leading pack in the final furlongs of the League Two season.
The Gas were in fine form in defeating Sutton United 2-0 at the Mem, with Harry Anderson and Aaron Collins scoring fine goals either side of half time.
Rovers will know they could have added several more goals throughout a night where they were reaching new levels in the fluidity of their attacking play, with Paul Coutts missing a penalty in first-half stoppage time and several other good chances went begging.
But the profligacy was Barton's only complaint on a crucial night for the Gas, which elevated them to 11th in League Two, seven points adrift of the play-offs with a game or two in hand on most of their rivals.
"I thought the lads were excellent right across the board," Barton said. "If I have one criticism though, it’s that we didn’t improve our goal difference (more).
"I thought the lads really came of age tonight with that performance, as I said the one critique I’ve got is that we didn’t get a third, fourth or fifth goal because we certainly had chances to do that based on how well the boys played.
"I said to the lads tonight 'If we’re going to push to the summit and reach the top of the mountain, tonight is a big night'.
"It was a chance to grab momentum off a team that’s 12 unbeaten. Tonight was a chance to close the gap on teams who weren’t playing that we’ve got games in hand on.
"I felt we had to take maximum points from tonight. I demanded it from them and they rose to the challenge. As I say, the only disappointment for me is that we haven’t put another couple of dents in them to help our goal difference."
The Gas have lost just once in their past nine League Two games and Tuesday's win provided several causes for belief to grow on the terraces.
Two points from a possible nine halted their climb up the table, but after Tuesday's triumph Barton believes his side could be hitting their stride at the perfect time to give themselves a chance of overcoming a poor first half of the campaign.
He said: "There’s loads to go in the season, but for the first time in my tenure here we’ve gone from being a losing side to being a grinding, difficult-to-beat side to now being a side capable of stringing a couple of back-to-backs and clean sheets together, which is needed if you’re going to be successful.
"I still feel the best is yet to come from this group. We’ve got the championship rounds coming up in the last quarter of the season and we’re just getting stronger and stronger and stronger.
"We’ve got to keep working hard. It’s a tough league and we’ve given a few teams a head start.
"We’ve got some tough fixtures ahead, but if we were at Cheltenham or Ascot and I was at the finish line and I was looking at the horses coming, I wouldn’t swap mine for anybody. Maybe Forest Green, due to how many points they have.
"But again, we’re coming along nicely."
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