ACCRINGTON Stanley boss John Coleman felt his side were fully deserving of their Checkatrade Trophy win over West Brom Under 21s, despite leaving it late.

After a goalless first half, Jordan Clark gave Stanley the lead they deserved against the Baggies youngsters, after latching onto a backheel from Luke Charman.

Jonathan Leko equalised from close range just after the hour.

And just when the game looked destined to be settled by a penalty shoot-out, Ross Sykes rose to nod in a stoppage time winner from a short corner and Seamus Conneely’s cross to secure Stanley’s place in the competition’s knockout stage with a game to spare.

“I was quite looking forward to penalties to be honest,” smiled Coleman. “But it’s always good to get a win. We wanted to win the game.

“We’ve gone three games without winning so we were mindful of that, that we wanted to break that little bit of a sequence, and I thought we played well enough to win the game.

“We made countless chances, the keeper’s made a couple of great saves and we’ve been a little bit wasteful in front of goal. But they were two smashing goals to score. I’m disappointed with the goal we conceded but in the main I think we were good value for the win.

“You’ve just got to keep going. A lot of those players played Bury last week in the Lancashire Senior Cup and the desire and the appetite they showed then was fantastic and it was replicated tonight.”