Paul Simpson praised the grit of his Carlisle players following their 2-1 win over AFC Wimbledon.

Paul Huntington, Jordan Gibson and Owen Moxon all had half-chances for the Cumbrian team in the opening 30 minutes of the Sky Bet League Two contest at Brunton Park.

Callum Guy put Carlisle ahead seconds before the break with his first goal for the club.

Ayoud Assal levelled with a confident finish just before the hour but Kristian Dennis decided it with nine minutes to go after heading home from Jack Armer’s knockdown.

Carlisle manager Simpson said: “I’m delighted with the three points. I accept it wasn’t the best game of football in terms of passing but we battled, scrapped and showed real character and togetherness.

“We stuck together and the fans stuck with us. Today my final message was just find a way to win. If you win at home, you’re on track to be OK.

“I would have liked it to be a better football performance but saying that I’m chuffed to bits we are going away with the win.

“It wasn’t a win-at-all-costs game, but it was a game we had to win.

“I want to test the keepers more and we have done that today. Callum (Guy) struck it brilliantly today. He decided to have a go and I’m really pleased for him. He’s been excellent for us this season.

“AFC Wimbledon are in a bit of a rut but they have some good players and they will come good.

“They played good football and we had to change our shape to stop them playing out so easily.

“They have good individuals and will come good, I’m just glad they didn’t come good today.”

The visitors’ boss Johnnie Jackson felt his side deserved more from the game.

“It is disappointing to have lost when we were so close to taking something away,” he said. “I thought we deserved more from the game today on the balance of play.

“The first half was very scrappy and nothing much in it all. It was a bad time to concede the goal, but I thought we regrouped well at half-time and the response to get back into it was very good.

“We could have gone on to win it after that, we were certainly the better team.

“We have again conceded a goal at a bad time when we needed to keep the concentration levels high.

“There are positives we can take from the game and that is what we will do. Results are not as we would like them to be and we are all hurting.

“We will stick together as a team and keep working hard on the pitch and believing in ourselves. We will fight to turn it around.”