YORK CITY manager David Webb has explained the reasoning for star man Shaq Forde’s substitution in last night’s 2-0 defeat to Oldham Athletic.

Forde has had a brilliant start to life in North Yorkshire after joining the club on a loan deal until the end of the season from Sky Bet Championship side Watford, netting four goals in four games. 

The 18-year-old even made history with the Minstermen, becoming York’s youngest ever player to score a hattrick in City’s 4-1 victory over Maidstone United.

“Shaq had a knock in training as well so we need to be careful of that.” Webb confirmed.

“But he’s done fantastic for us and you’ve got to remember he’s 18 years of age and we need him for a lot of games so it’s just a case of managing him. 

“But he wasn't playing badly or anything like that at all and it wasn’t a tactical change, but we’ve just got to manage him because he’s had a knock and we could see he wasn’t moving right from our side so we had to make the change. 

“We just thought it was the best way to go.”

Ethan Ross was a casualty of the disappointing defeat to Oldham, with the goalkeeper suffering a head injury that forced a substitution for recent signing Maison Campbell, who only re-joined the club on Monday.

“Ethan’s going to have to have a ten day recovery period because it’s a head injury but he’s fine, it’s his conscious. But he’ll be out for ten days.

“Maison did okay, he’s only been in the building for a couple of days and he’s only had a couple of days training with us, so what he did do he did okay.

"He was beaten for that second goal, it happens, but apart from that he looked okay."

Alex Whittle, Luke James and Manny Duku were absent from the match, despite Whittle and Duku featuring recently against Chelmsford, whilst James continues to recover from a calf injury

“Alex is still on his way back and he’s going to be ready for selection later on this week just to get a few more minutes. 

“It’s the same with James who also needs more minutes in the tank. 

“[On Duku] We felt with the team we went with tonight with the wide players because Shaq is a number nine as well, and Lenny’s [Lenell John-Lewis] a number nine.

"We felt we had two number nines out there and could change it if we needed to and we’ve got a big squad so sometimes we need to rotate.

“With the full-backs, obviously Ryan [Fallowfield] can come on and Hursty [Alex Hurst] can move different and Ducky [Michael Duckworth] can play centre-back so we had enough versatility if we needed it. 

It was a disappointing result for York however, with goals from Josef Yarney and Timmy Abraham condemning Webb’s side to a bitter 2-0 defeat.

“We did say that if we could get a goal early we could potentially go on to win it and we didn’t really do that in the second half other than a couple of half-decent attempts. 

“I think we have to look at ourselves on that and it’s quite a disappointing evening’s work.” 

But with penalty controversy being a damning factor for York again, it was frustration for Webb after John-Lewis’ claims for a handball in the box were waved away.

“I thought it was a penalty to be fair. That would’ve got us into the game at 1-1 and we would’ve been right back into it. We had the free-kick in the first half where we’ve hit the bar and in the second half we’ve had a few half-decent shots.

"I thought we were alright in the first half, we controlled the game and it’s just a soft goal. The second half performance just weren’t good enough for me.

“We need to be going into this game [Maidenhead United on Saturday 28, 3pm] with a positive mindset. We’ve lost tonight, it’s difficult for us all to take, it’s disappointing for us as a team and as a football club and a performance.

"But we’ve got to shake it off, we’ve got to go again and we’ve got another game on Saturday and we’ve got to try and win the game."