"With a home cup tie, you have to take the advantage and eventually, we did just that.  The team that we did put out though probably wasn't our strongest.  Unfortunately at the moment, we haven't got too much competition.  I only had two strikers and I had to rest one of them.  If I lose one then I am struggling for Saturday and that was the reason why Ryan Lowe did not play on Tuesday."

"I have to wrap the players in cotton wool at the moment because I cannot risk picking up any more injuries.  We went a goal down and I was looking at Ryan Lowe thinking do I throw him on, but we decided to leave it, though in the end, in the second half - we were fantastic."

"We played Mike Jones up front and there are a few players that can play in that position.  Mike Jones, Danny Racchi and Dave Worrall - they can all play all over the place.  The first half was frustrating.  We had decent possession but kind of went sideways or backwards and it was too slow.  For the second half I just said go forward quicker and run forward quicker because we can upset people."

"We had three players in the starting line up that are over 23.  They were mostly technical players and I just liked that energy and enthusiasm that they give us.  Irrespective of whatever the result was going to be I thought that we were excellent.  For me, the big thing was that they wanted to get forward and that they had an urgency about them.  I like that in a team"

"The pitch suited our game but at the same time, it also suited Tranmere and how they played and they do have some good players within their squad.  It was a pretty entertaining game considering it was the Johnstones Paint Trophy.  Usually there's not much in it and the situation that Tranmere are going through adds to it, but both sets of players were excellent and the football that was played was really good."

"With the players that we have available at the moment, we don't want to go to penalties, we have to go for it.  I didn't want it to drag on so we went out to try and get it over and done with and fortunately for us, we scored two very good goals."

"Tranmere might be struggling, but they are still a division higher, they do have very good players.  It's a credit to our players that they competed really well.  You listen to people's reactions, and in the first half some of the crowd were getting on the players backs.  Tom Elliott is 18 and is just learning the game.  I can hear people having a go at him.  Why can't they just help him?  I don't know what they expect.  Do they expect the finished article straight away?  We haven't got that.  Eight of the players were under 23 so they are still learning the game.  Encouragement would help, but in the second half we did everything that we wanted to do in the first half.  Sometimes you have to give the opposition some credit because Tranmere were very good."

The above text represents around four minutes from the full eight minute video interview with Alan Knill.Login or subscribe to Shakers Player to watch the full video by clicking here using our 14 day free trial.