Steve Cotterill was delighted by his battling players as Shrewsbury overcame the elements as well as beating Fleetwood 1-0.

Tom Bayliss hit the game’s only goal 30 minutes in and, after failing to add to their lead in the first half, the Shrews had to stand up to something of an onslaught from their hosts after the break.

And, after a feisty conclusion to the game, with a flurry of cards shown by referee Thomas Parsons, including one for Shrewsbury physio Dan Green, Cotterill hailed his squad for their application in the swirling wind and rain.

“It was a great win in terrible conditions,” he said. “The wind played havoc with it but we could have put the game to bed by half-time, we’ve had some great chances.

“With the wind behind us we could have been three or four goals to the good, maybe won it by half-time. We had a couple of good chances in the second half to put it to bed too.

“The second half was different, we knew the weather forecast was for strong winds and it’s quite open here by the sea so we knew coming here today it was going to be a difficult game.

“I don’t mind if we score scrappy goals but we’ll take the one goal and the clean sheet. I thought today to a man everybody had a big game, they were tremendous today. It was really good stuff from all of the boys.

“And Dan’s a bad boy, isn’t he? We’ll have to have a chat with him in the week – seriously, he’s probably the nicest guy you’ll ever come across, he was just trying to enter the field of play because we had two or three injured in clashes so I don’t know what’s happening.”

Fleetwood boss Scott Brown admitted his side’s first-half performance was far from the levels he expects, though he felt they improved enough after the break to warrant some reward.

“It was a disappointing afternoon for us,” he said. “The first 45 minutes was a waste of time, our lads didn’t turn up and there was no pressure whatsoever on the ball.

“The shape behind the ball was actually OK but somebody’s got to go and set the tone, whether that’s with a tackle or a through ball or something. They all just looked a bit scared. Shrewsbury got their tactics right, they were aggressive and got in our faces and they probably deserved to go in 1-0 up at half-time.

“The lads were exceptional in the second half, they came out and got right in their faces and created plenty of chances, but once we get in these areas we have to pick a man out or hit the target with our shots, we’ve got to have more bodies in the box, willing to score a goal. I think that’s what we lacked today.

“There’s always a chance we could have got caught out on the counter when we were trying to push bodies forward but for us it’s disappointing.

“The performances of the referee and linesman weren’t great, we had a stonewall penalty when Callum Morton was pushed in the back. If that was my performance I’d be disappointed with it.”