"The lads have worked so hard for each other," says Millington after much-needed Town win over York

Rob Harker's first goal for the club was enough to earn a precious three points for Halifax and lift them up to 19th in the National League table.

"I thought it was a really enjoyable game of football," Millington said.

"York played their part, they came into the game right up at the top end of the form table and they've been playing some fantastic football and getting some excellent results.

"So although we started strong and we had a very, very good first-half, we knew they would have a spell in the game and they certainly did in the second-half.

"So it made for a really entertaining game."

Millington added: "We needed the performance, but as we're getting into the latter stages of the second-half, that performance turning into a result was also crucial.

"Although they had territory, some good possession and balls into the box, Sam's not really had a save to make and we defended really well.

"I feel if we'd have performed as well as we did and the worst had happened it would have been a hammer blow to confidence, given such a good performance.

"The longer the game went on a 1-0 the more important it became for us that we finished at 1-0.

"I'm really pleased for the lads that's how it panned out."

When asked what had pleased him most about the performance, the Town boss said: "You can take it in both halves, in the first-half some of the combination play between the front four was fantastic, we were cutting through them at will at times and creating some really good opportunities.

"We had some excellent pressure because of the way that Jordan Keane and Luke Summerfield were backing up the attacks and making sure that when they did break down, we won the ball back high up the pitch.

"The centre-halves and the full-backs contributed by securing that possession and keeping us in the opposition half a lot more than we have been doing in recent games.

"So that was the pleasing aspect, was the possession side of the game in the first-half.

"Clearly, because we've been conceding goals, we came into this game as a staff looking for resilience and not only the ability to defend and work as a cohesive unit out of possession, but that resilience to keep going under stress.

"York gave us some of that and now the lads can go away confident that they can defend well and remain resilient when opposition teams have spells of possession and spells of territory.

"There were a lot of pleasing aspects to the performance."

Town were unrecognisable from the dreadful display in their 4-0 thrashing at home to Woking on Saturday.

"I mentioned in my programme notes that, at Aldershot, the defeat could be classed as a blip, we then go to Eastleigh and get beat, and probably don't deserve to lose, we might not have deserved to win it but I don't think we deserved to lose it either," Millington said.

"Then having the Woking performance, which suggested the Aldershot performance wasn't just a blip, created an opportunity for us to really dig deep and start to search deeper than just technical and tactical solutions, and look more into issues that were beneath that.

"I think we've asked more of the lads, we've asked them to put a bit more heart and soul into the performances, and we've tried to put them in a position where they understand how important they are to each other, that one person's performance heavily relies on another person's and another person's and so on.

"I think that's been the thing that's most impacted the performance is that the lads have worked so hard for each other and shown that they wanted it possibly that bit more than York did."

Millington made four changes to his side for the game, which turned out to be justified, with all four players coming into the team performing well.

"Lads have put in real shifts and there's been an awful lot of effort put into not gaining a great deal of points over the previous games," Millington said.

"We looked at the game from Saturday and you could see some elements of physical and mental fatigue, and we needed to freshen that up and not only give other players an opportunity but also give some of the lads a break who've really tried to help us get points and have been, in some cases, unfortunate not to help secure us those points.

"So there were a lot of considerations.

"We're very pleased with the squad of players we've put together but clearly, we've had to work hard to find the right combination to get that performance and we're going to have to rely on everybody within the squad to maintain those levels of effort and energy in the upcoming games."

On match-winner Harker, Millington said: "Rob's an excellent finisher, he's an out and out number nine, he wants to score goals, he wants to be in the box, he wants balls coming into him.

"He's not got a huge amount of first-team experience and he's learning very, very quickly.

"The other players have helped him a great deal, I think Mani Dierseruvwe has helped him a great deal by setting an example of what it takes playing up top on your own, to press, to force mistakes, to try and hold the ball up, to fight to win seconds.

"Mani's contributed to his development so far and other players in training, demanding more out of him, and I think we're starting to see the benefits of that and Rob is starting to show what he can do.

"He's got an awful lot going for him as a number nine and I think he can help us get better and climb the table, he's definitely got a part to play."

Town put their run of conceding ten goals in their previous three outings behind them with a clean sheet.

"Conceding ten goals in the last three games is a big worry, it's one thing not scoring a great deal but when you start conceding as well," said Millington.

"We're 12 games in and we've got four clean sheets, so clearly we can do it but what we've got to do is do it on a regular basis, we've got to make sure we don't concede and if we don't concede then I'd back us to go on and score goals.

"The problem we've had is we've conceded soft goals and that's then led to a lack of confidence when we're trying to build and create opportunities.

"So we've got to work hard to keep clean sheets and if we do then I'm sure we'll go on to win a lot more games."

Kian Spence was taken off after a man-of-the-match display, but Millington said he wasn't injured.

"No, he was exhausted! I think the lad was absolutely wiped out, he'd covered so much ground and put in so much effort to get back and help out when we were under pressure, alongside the other players, and then sprinting to get up and join the attack when we were breaking.

"He just needed a breather and we felt the important thing for the team was to maintain the level of energy in there, so Harvey was a great player to put in that position to try and maintain some of that energy."

Read more from the Town boss in Thursday's Halifax Courier and on the Courier website later this week.