Sam Foley lauds Barrow ‘resilience’ after dramatic win over Oldham

Interim head coach Sam Foley hailed relegation-threatened Barrow’s resilience after their stunning 3-2 victory over play-off chasing Oldham.

Substitute Isaac Fletcher scored a stoppage-time winner to cap a frantic finale which produced four late goals after Latics led 1-0 after 82 minutes.

Kai Payne’s 49th-minute strike put the visitors in front before Danny Rose equalised and Josh Gordon edged Barrow in front a minute later.

Tom Pett made it 2-2 in the 88th minute only for Fletcher to convert a cross from fellow sub Elliot Newby in added time.

Barrow remain one point from Newport in 22nd place but can move out of the bottom two with victory over Walsall on Saturday before their rivals kick-off.

“It is not going to be easy the situation we are in,” admitted Foley.

“They are going to be asked to go places they didn’t realise they could go to. But they have proved they have got it.

“Given the situation, the easy thing would be to give up and maybe not take the extra yard. But the players won’t do that.

“They have shown they have got that resilience and that bit extra.

“The bigger picture is we will find out at the end of the season if we have enough.

“The most important thing is the three points. You don’t always remember how you got them.

“But this will be a memorable one to show resilience to fight back to going behind, getting pegged back and then getting the winner.

“We knew we had performances in us. The games have been tough against good opposition.

“We haven’t always had the rub of the green but it showed you can make your own luck and they deserve it for everything they gave.”

Oldham manager Micky Mellon put on a brave face after his team’s late collapse, refusing to criticise his players.

But he admitted: “How can you see that coming? You can’t legislate for that.

“We just ran out of legs. You look at the players who have come in, they probably haven’t had a lot of football.

“However, we have a lot of guys who have played a lot of football who were missing.

“So, we looked a very leggy group for some reason towards the end of the game.

“That is why I am being careful choosing my words because we have had a brilliant season up until now.

“When the emotions go out of it this group has done fantastically well to even take it to this stage.

“We will learn and we know what we have to do moving forward.

“There are three big games still to play and we will build.”