Barnsley manager Valerien Ismael was pleased to see his side prevail 2-1 in their “fight” against a direct Wycombe side.
Cauley Woodrow’s 61st-minute penalty earned the Tykes a fourth home win from their last six after a Joe Jacobson penalty had levelled matters following Callum Styles’ first-half opener.
Ismael said: “The most important thing was getting the win in this game. We tried to find a way out wide – that was the game plan and it worked for our first goal and in other situations.
“The game was a fight in terms of set-pieces and second balls and we fought to the end and showed another quality to our game.
“The penalty we conceded also shouldn’t have been a penalty because it was outside of the box, but we showed a strong mentality to go on and win the game.
“You can’t lose against the teams near the bottom, you have to win, so I’m delighted that we did.
“The young guys we have are learning how to play under pressure and their response has been good. They are very focused and showed a lot of togetherness, even the players coming off the bench, who gave us a lot of energy and more possibilities to be dangerous.”
Wycombe have now failed to win on any of their four trips to Barnsley and lie second-bottom in the Sky Bet Championship table, with manager Gareth Ainsworth admitting the display was his side’s poorest for a while.
He said: “We have played a lot better in the last eight games and this was probably our worst performance in that time.
“The fixture schedule might have played a part because I wanted to play a similar set of personnel and system, but credit to Barnsley too because they played well and put their game together a lot better than we did, which happens.
“We just need to recover and try and get points on the board in our next game.”
On the penalty decisions, Ainsworth added: “I thought both penalties were correct but, while I don’t like to see players get sent off, I thought the foul on Garath McCleary was a cynical one.
“It was a test for us to see if we could stay solid and keep a clean sheet on a wet and cold night in Yorkshire. We haven’t done that but we’re Wycombe playing in the Championship and we’ll put this to bed and bounce back, don’t worry about that.”
