Crewe boss Lee Bell appeared to point the finger at Harrogate following a freak injury to matchwinner Zac Williams, who tripped over a frost sheet.
Williams’ 31st-minute header secured a 1-0 win for Alex but he limped out of the action at the end of the first half after falling over and twisting his ankle.
It was an incident that Bell thought could have been avoided, arguing that the sheets had been deliberately positioned to combat Mickey Demetriou’s long throw, which proved the source of Williams’ goal.
“They put the frost sheets down because of Mickey’s throw-in, which we ended up scoring the winner from anyway,” the Crewe chief claimed. “I spotted them when we went out and moved them because they were too close to the touchline and we said that somebody would trip over or crash into them.
“As it happened, Zac went over them and twisted his ankle going to get the ball, so it was a freak accident but one I think could have been avoided.”
Bell was pleased, however, with his team’s first back-to-back away wins since August 2021, adding: “Our away form is getting better and it couldn’t have got much worse, let’s be honest. But we have a percentage of points we want to pick up away from home to make sure we progress in the league and we’re on track to achieving that.
“It was a fantastic win off the back of our first home defeat for a long time. Harrogate were also coming off the back of a heavy loss, so it was all about two teams looking for a reaction and I thought we were really professional throughout and controlled large periods.”
Harrogate boss Simon Weaver watched his team slump to a fifth straight home defeat – the club’s worst sequence since 2010.
He felt there were signs of improvement but admitted that Williams’ goal was “really poor” from a defensive perspective.
“We’ve been through their goal on the video and I think we made honest mistakes, because a number of players went for the same ball,” Weaver pointed out. “They wanted to do the right thing but they got in each other’s way and it was a bit of carnage in there, so it ended up being a really poor goal to concede.
“Overall, I’m a little bit down about the result, but I thought the performance was a lot better, especially in the second half when we were more aggressive in our approach and caused them problems by playing with energy in their half. We could have maybe cranked up the intensity a bit more in the last 10 minutes and gone a bit more direct.
“That might have got us a scruffy goal, but we were, at least, asking a few more questions than in the first half. The next step now is to get that home win.”
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