BRAINTREE Town manager Brad Quinton said he would give his players recovery time this week after two gruelling games in sweltering temperatures in three days over the Bank Holiday weekend.

The Iron are preparing for Saturday’s Vanarama National League South trip to Oxford City, before a return home to face Welling United on Tuesday (kick-off 7.45pm) and the manager admitted that some of his players may have felt the pace of their last two games.

It was especially tough as they beat leaders St Albans City 1-0 with an energetic performance on a hot afternoon on Monday.

Quinton said: “Two games in three days in that sort of heat - I take my hat off to them.

“I used to do it, but not now!

“We had Tuesday night off after that and we’ll probably do some stretching with them and some yoga in training on Thursday with some deep tissue massages as we prepare for Oxford.

“They are an honest bunch of lads and we’ll look after them.”

Quinton had been disappointed to only take a point at bottom club Whitehawk last weekend, but was pleased with how his players responded on Bank Holiday Monday as they out-played a St Albans side who had won all of their first six games of the campaign.

The Iron completely dominated the opening half and while they had to wait until after the break to get the decisive goal, they showed their maturity in staying patient to get the result against the leaders.

Quinton added: “I was very pleased with the response against a team who were top of the league and who play the same sort of football – with pace and energy – as we do.

“The performance at Whitehawk had been terrible in the first half there, but to come back was great and we had to be patient.

“We did our jobs and stuck to the game plan. We needed to be solid and to get to a certain point so we could attack and break them down.

“We knew that if we kept doing what we needed to then the goal would come.

“We had to be patient but knew that we couldn’t over-play it; we had to keep pressuring and working hard and we knew the pace and great work-rate that we have would bring the goal.

“We could have had four or five in the first half so we had to be patient.

“It would have been an injustice had we come away with nothing as I thought we were the better team and the fans got their money’s worth.”

Meanwhile, Quinton said he wouldn’t be pursuing a deal to bring former Iron midfielder and fans’ favourite Matt Paine to the club at the moment.

The Braintree boss had looked into a deal with Paine’s current parent club, Billericay Town, that would have taken him on loan, but he felt the offer on the table wasn’t in his team’s favour so opted not to go through with it. Quinton added: “Matt has gone to Concord now.

“They (Billericay) tried to hold us to a month’s loan, but in that month, he could only play for the three weeks because the fourth week was the FA Cup week.

“We’d have still had to pay him for that week, though.

“For me, he’s a fantastic player, but I think you can see that with the boys that we have here now, we don’t need to do those bits of business at this time.

“It’s too early.

“Had it been a season-long loan then we may have stepped up the offer but I’m proud of my boys and we don’t need to do any business at the minute in that position.

“I thought Christian Frimpong was excellent against St Albans and Alfred (Mugabo) as well.

“He does the spoiling work that no-one sees.

“That allows Christian to step in and make rolling runs forward.

“Alfred’s discipline to break things up and distribute the ball to the full-backs was tremendous.

“We had a game plan and it worked for us.”