Bristol City manager Nigel Pearson believes progressing in the Carabao Cup could help foster a winning mentality in his squad after they reached the third round with a 3-1 win at Wycombe.
The Robins have now won their last three games in all competitions and their extra quality told at Adams Park as they earned a home tie against Lincoln.
Pearson said: “It’s about winning games. If we can win cup games and get further, fine.
“The most important thing is the league but I also think, to develop a winning mentality, it’s important to try and win every game.
“For instance, if we’d have been turned over after making seven changes, people would moan about that – people always want to moan about something, so I just let them.
“It was just an ugly game because it turned out to be that but you’ve got to be able to win these games.”
Bristol City were ahead after seven minutes when debutant Dylan Kadji netted from close range but Wycombe hit back early in the second half when Ali Al-Hamadi nodded in Anis Mehmeti’s cross.
The Robins hit the front again in the 77th minute through Kane Wilson’s volley before Tommy Conway squared for Antoine Semenyo to finish the tie in stoppage time.
Wycombe boss Gareth Ainsworth said: “I really wanted to take them all the way to penalties but their experience told in the end.
“I’m disappointed with definitely one of the goals – we gave it to them, the third one, and the second one we can probably defend better.
“We had some real chances. It wasn’t anything we didn’t expect, it wasn’t one-way traffic and there were some real bright sparks in my team.
“We had eight players under the age of 22 in the starting line-up, which is brilliant for us.”
