Darrell Clarke urged his Cheltenham players to enjoy the moment as they finally ended their wait for a win this season with a 1-0 victory over Cambridge.
The game was settled by Liam Sercombe’s sublime goal in the fifth minute, earning the Robins their first three-point haul of the campaign at the 13th attempt.
It also secured Clarke’s first victory since being appointed as boss at the end of September.
Clarke set his team the target of 15 wins to survive this season and he was delighted to see the first one ticked off.
“The club has never stayed in League One for four successive seasons before,” Clarke said. “That is our aim as a football club and we want all the fans to buy into that.
“Yes, we’ve had a disastrous start that’s made it very difficult for ourselves, but you can see the lads today get a standing ovation coming off the pitch because the fans know the players have left everything out there.
“So, one of 15 wins down and onto the next, but I want the lads to enjoy the moment as well. Then it’s back to work on Monday.”
Experienced midfielder Sercombe, who played under Clarke at Bristol Rovers, beat goalkeeper Jack Stevens with a deft chip from 20 yards.
It was only the bottom-placed Robins’ second league goal of the season, but they are already showing signs of improvement under Clarke.
They had picked up a creditable 1-1 draw with Derby County in their last league outing and they started well against a Cambridge side who were winless in six.
Liam Smith forced a save from Stevens a minute before Sercombe’s breakthrough and Tom Bradbury was also close in the 11th minute.
Rob Street’s header from Sean Long’s crossed drifted just past the far post before half-time.
James Olayinka tested Stevens early in the second half, but Cambridge were close a leveller when Michael Morrison’s close-range header cleared the bar in the 70th minute.
Street saw another headed effort turned over by a flying Stevens three minutes later and Smith was denied by Morrison’s block late on, but Cheltenham had done enough to end their 175-day wait for a win.
Cambridge boss Mark Bonner admitted his team need to rediscover the form that saw them win four of their first six league games this season.
“It’s a brilliant finish from Sercombe, who is a top player,” he said.
“We have to get our performance levels back to the first three games of the season.
“You look at a batch of games where you think you can pick up points, but in the latest batch we’ve picked up just one.
“In the first half we wanted the players to be more direct and we knew it would be difficult.
“Cheltenham got a good point against Derby and you can see they are playing for their new manager.”
Ranieri comes out of retirement to take charge of Roma
Claudio Ranieri has come out of retirement to take charge of Roma until the end of the season.
The Italian retired in May, calling time on a career in which he famously led Leicester City to a shock Premier League title in 2016 and coached a host of teams from Europe's top leagues, including Chelsea, Juventus, Atletico Madrid, Inter and Monaco.
Ranieri, who last coached Cagliari in Serie A, returns for a third stint in charge of Roma, with whom he came agonisingly close to winning the Serie A title in his first spell between 2009 and 2011.
Across his previous two spells, the 73-year-old managed 96 games in all competitions, registering 53 wins, with a win percentage of 55.21%.
"Roma is pleased to announce that Claudio Ranieri is the new Technical Manager of the First Team," Roma said in a statement.
"At the end of the season he will take on a senior managerial role, he will be an advisor to the ownership for all sporting matters of the club.
"The search for a new coach will continue in the coming months and Claudio will also have a say in this decision."
Ranieri replaces Juric, who was sacked after Roma lost 3-2 at home against Bologna on Sunday, leaving them languishing in 12th place in the Serie A standings.
Juric, who won just four of his 12 games in charge of the club, was Roma's second coach to be fired this season, with Daniele De Rossi being sacked in September.
According to reports in Italian media, Roma found it difficult to sign a replacement for the Croatian before settling on Ranieri, with former Italy coach Roberto Mancini and Maurizio Sarri among the preferred candidates.
Ranieri's first game will be away to league leaders Napoli on November 24.
Real Madrid hit Twente for seven, five-star Wolfsburg also win big
Real Madrid had six different goalscorers as they trounced Twente 7-0 in the Women's Champions League on Wednesday, while Wolfsburg beat Galatasaray 5-0.
Signe Bruun opened the scoring three minutes into the Group B encounter at the Estadio Alfredo Di Stefano, then Maria Mendez's header gave Madrid a 2-0 half-time lead.
Madrid, who had won one and lost one of their opening two games in the tournament, got a third through Naomie Feller five minutes into the second half, then Caroline Weir made it 4-0 with a brilliant free-kick.
Mendez headed home her second of the encounter shortly after the hour mark, while Oihane Hernandez and Carla Camacho got on the scoresheet late on to complete the rout.
The victory took Madrid second in the Group B standings ahead of Chelsea's trip to Celtic.
Wolfsburg were also convincing victors in Group A, getting off the mark for this season's competition as Rebecka Blomqvist scored a hat-trick in their 5-0 thrashing of Galatasaray.
The Bundesliga side – who failed to pick up a point or score a goal in their opening two matches – had a narrow 1-0 lead at half-time through Joelle Wedemeyer, before Blomqvist took centre-stage in the second period.
She tapped home after Janina Minge struck the crossbar, then added her second goal in the 77th minute and her third six minutes into stoppage time.
Vivien Endemann powered home a fifth for Wolfsburg one minute later, as they provisionally moved within three points of Lyon and Roma ahead of their meeting.
Taylor pleased with City's physical test during Hammarby win
Manchester City head coach Gareth Taylor was pleased with how his team stood up to the physical challenge of Hammarby in their 2-0 Champions League victory on Tuesday.
City's win extended their unbeaten start to the season, having won every game in all competitions following a 2-2 draw against Arsenal on opening day.
“Difficult game for us, physical challenge, a physical team in Hammarby. I think they outnumber us a little bit in terms of size, considering when you look at our midfield. But I thought the girls handled it really well," Taylor said after the game
“I thought we dominated the game. In the early parts we were just a little bit off in our final action. We just needed to speed up a little bit in terms of being on the end of it, and we spoke about that at half-time, and we score with Laura getting into that type of position we’d been talking about.
“[The physicality was something] we were prepared for, but dealing with it is a different thing. Having Bunny [Khadija Shaw] and Alanna [Kennedy] on the pitch, two of our more physical players, is really important, particularly for set-plays.
“At 1-0 we were defending a couple of scenarios like that, Yama [Ayaka Yamashita] making a really good save at one point. Then Aoba [Fujino] got the goal that maybe allowed us to change things up a little bit more, get some people off that we’d like to manage.
“I think the girls have dealt with it really well tonight. We expected it, we thought it would be difficult, and they rose to the challenge.”
The victory leaves City top of their Champions League group with a 100% record after three matches, three points above second-placed Barcelona.
Taylor had made changes to City's starting XI, with Lauren Hemp among the trio to drop out from the weekend and she did not feature in the squad. Ahead of their weekend game against Chelsea, who are second in the WSL, Taylor explained the reasoning behind Hemp's absence.
“We’ve just got an issue with Lauren that we just need to analyse a little bit further, that’s all," he said.
“It’s something that potentially happened in the Palace game [on 3 November]. She was able to play in the Tottenham game [last Friday] but wasn’t able to tonight, so we’ll just take a little bit longer to assess and find out more.
“Hopefully [she can play against Chelsea]. There’s an opportunity there, we’ll just have to take a moment tomorrow, have a good conversation and find out where we’re at with the medical staff.”
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