Knaresborough Town boss Simon Parkes hails the growing belief in his squad after comeback win over Handsworth FC

Danny Edwards scored Knaresborough Town's first goal in their comeback win over Handsworth. Pictures: Gerard Binks

Simon Parkes hailed the growing belief in Knaresborough Town’s dressing room after his side came back from 2-0 down to sink high-flying Handsworth.

The Manse Lane outfit made a nightmare start to Saturday’s NCEL Premier Division clash and were left staring down the barrel having conceded twice inside the opening six minutes.

But, they got themselves back in the contest when Danny Edwards intercepted an attempted back-pass and halved the deficit, then went on to turn the game on its head after the break.

Brad Walker followed up after his initial strike had been saved to level matters on 57 minutes before Cameron Bedford sent Dom Creamer clean through to make it 3-2 soon afterwards.

Knaresborough Town manager Simon Parkes.

"I think there is an element of belief in the building now that we haven’t had at Knaresborough Town for a couple of seasons,” boss Parkes said.

"After what has been a pretty successful October for us I think the atmosphere is refreshed and we are going into games in what is a really tight and competitive division believing that we can turn anyone over.

"Handsworth were in the top six before Saturday and I’m sure that they went into that game expecting to come away with all three points. But we’ve beaten them and Barton Town in recent weeks, two sides who will probably be title-challengers, and I think that shows how far we have come.”

On Saturday’s fight-back, Parkes added: "It was a pretty explosive start to the game. We were all over the shop and looked very poor, we’ll hold our hands up to that.

"But, I actually think that eased the pressure on us and then we just had to go for it. Credit to the team, we shored things up at the back and then looked to try and get ourselves back into the game.

"Getting that first goal back before half-time was very important. It swung the momentum in our favour and I told the lads that at half-time and told them to stay on the front foot and keep the pressure on and that is what we did.

"I believed they could turn it around and so did they, and we’ve done exceptionally well to come back from two down.”

Saturday’s result lifts Boro up to 13th in the NCEL Premier Division standings.