NATHAN Jones admitted Charlton Athletic were “better off without the ball” after they beat Middlesbrough 1-0 at the Riverside Stadium with just one-fifth of the possession.
Conor Coady scored the only goal of the game in the 59th minute when he touched home the ball with his studs from Harry Clarke’s throw-in. It was Coady’s 400th league career start and his first goal since his move from Wrexham.
The result took the Addicks nine points clear of the Championship relegation zone as they also did a favour for their neighbours Millwall, who remain just one place and one point behind second-placed Boro.
“It is all about the result for us at this point,” Jones said. “To come to one of the best teams in the division and put in that level of performance, I’m pleased. Every time we had the ball we gave it away – so we were better off without it.
“They have wonderful players, they will get promoted I am sure but my players did me proud. You saw a group wanting to defend and doing the basics well. It’s such an important part of the season to get back-to-back wins – it is a monster of a league.”
Jones added: “We never take anything for granted, we want to finish as high as we can.
“We’ve got nine games to go, if we pick up the points-per-game that we have this season, we should finish in a healthy position.
“Our goal is not to just survive. We haven’t come into this league just to survive, we’ve come into this league to finish as high as we can so we can build.
“We have a timeframe for what we want to do and we’re bang on that. This year, yes, the first priority is to make sure we’re in the league, but we want to finish as high as we can.”
Boro remain eight points behind leaders Coventry City.
Teesside boss Kim Hellberg said: ”It has been a theme where we have had a lot of opportunities and not won games. We have not been good enough in terms of scoring goals and we have two points from three home games.
“We scored seven goals in our last two games and could have scored seven today but we have to keep working and keep improving. It would be worse if we had only two chances all night.
“We need to win as many games as possible – we will try and win them all.”
