GARETH Ainsworth said Wanderers players and fans deserved today’s 4-1 win at Northampton Town as a reward for keeping the belief the team could turn their season around.

Blues were winless in eight going into this afternoon’s trip to Sixfields but they ripped into their struggling opponents from the off and carved them apart at will.

Jo Kuffour set the ball rolling by netting after just 14 seconds – before a Northampton player had touched the ball – and a Stuart Lewis goal in the second half sparked wild scenes of celebration among the 439 travelling supporters.

And Ainsworth said: “The fans deserved that because they were fantastic all game, absolutely fantastic. I praise every single one who came today because they have proved they want to stick with this club and get behind us. That’s the spirit I want from everybody.

“I’m so pleased for the boys. They have been there for me, and so have the fans. We’ve had a tough time and these are nice moments. Thanks for everyone who’s stuck with us and kept with us because we always knew something would be round the corner. Hopefully today’s proved it to a few people.”

The Blues boss gambled on pairing Kuffour with Dean Morgan in attack as he made five changes from the side that drew with Scunthorpe United last week, and was rewarded as both strikers scored and led the Cobblers’ back four a merry dance throughout.

He said: “Jo has been waiting patiently in the squad. He hasn’t started many games but he’s shown me in training in the last couple of weeks Jo Kuffour’s back to his best. He’s sharp and he can be a real pain for defenders. What a start for Jo – he was fantastic and ran his socks off.

“Dean was fantastic as well – they led the line so well, the rest of the boys had to follow.

“It wasn’t a 4-1 and we had four chances. We had a lot of chances and I might have a look at Dean Morgan’s [disallowed] headed goal because I’m not sure that was offside. We created a lot of chances, as we have been doing in recent weeks.”

Leon Johnson, Gary Doherty and Paris Cowan-Hall were all unable to feature due to injury, while there was another enforced change with Josh Scowen suspended and Ainsworth said: “I had a few dilemmas yesterday with team selection again. I lost a couple of players and we were down to the bare bones today, and in adversity we usually do pretty well. The lads have shown today they were up for that one.”

He added: “It was tough conditions and they approached the conditions in the perfect way, and I think barring ten minutes ten minutes at the start of the second half we ran the game quite well and deserved to win 4-1.

“It was always going to be a difficult game. It was quite end to end, the wind was terrible and the rain came down. We didn’t get much of a chance to play our attacking, flowing football but we’ve proved we can do the other side and create chances in adverse conditions, and we took them.”