'Tough times don't last but tough people do' - Ryan Lowe hails character of PNE after win at Stoke City

Ched Evans scored the only goal of the game as his glancing header from Alan Browne’s corner came off the inside of the far post and nestled into the back of the net.

It sent the Welshman and the travelling PNE support into pandemonium and sent North End up five places in the Championship table.

PNE came out on top having lost their last three in a row and it was all about finding a way to win, said Lowe: “I think the performance was just all about character today. We've had a tough two weeks, let's not kid ourselves.

"I thought we were fantastic in everything we did, we had a few injuries and a bit of bad luck I must say. We have been playing okay but sometimes you just need that little bit of resilience of the group. I said to them before the game, 'tough times don't last but tough people do' and we have that in abundance.

"Fair play, I thought there was loads of character. There was some good football but the football was irrelevant, the three points are the main thing.”

Lowe made four changes for the game, Bambo Diaby coming in for his second start of the season, Andrew Hughes returning from injury, Ali McCann starting for the first time since injury and Daniel Johnson also came in.

Lowe praised Diaby and all of his players for their efforts in the game, despite their current run of form and misfortune through injury, with Emil Riis being withdrawn in the first half at the Bet365 Stadium.

Lowe said: “We had everything we needed, Bambo came in having not played for a while and we'd done some work with him this week.

"When you're losing players it's tough but everyone knows their job and when they stick to their jobs we're good. People might look and say it's a 0-0 written all over it but we had the fire in our belly to go and get a goal because that's what we wanted.

"We felt if we kept the back door shut there would be opportunities for us and that's what he had. A well worked corner and a great header from Ched.”