AFTER not winning a league game at the County Ground since August 18, hopes were high last Saturday that Phil Brown’s Swindon Town side would end their winless run against a struggling Northampton side.

But once again this season the home crowd left disappointed as we failed to score from open play, a superb Matt Taylor free-kick earning Town a point after the away side took the lead in the second half.

Brown has to start quickly picking up some home results if he has any plans for promotion this season or getting the majority of the Swindon fans on board, something the last manager David Flitcroft failed to do and never recovered from.

Fortunately, Town had a chance on Tuesday to shake off that disappointment as they travelled to Plymouth in the Checkatrade Trophy.

And the manager did see a response from his players as Town brushed aside their opponents 3-0 to have a chance of qualifying from the group stage of this dud competition.

Despite such a comprehensive victory over a League One side, it’s hard to tell what can be taken as real positives.

The home side made six changes to their normal starting XI and Town also rotated their team with a big game away at Exeter coming up this weekend.

But despite the lack of real competitiveness from the contest there were impressive performances from Ellis Iandolo and Scott Twine.

Two of the biggest plusses came from seeing Dion Conroy back in the starting XI and the long-awaited return of striker Kaiyne Woolery.

Hopefully Conroy is over the worst of his injury problems and can return to being a regular in a Town shirt.

I’ve waxed lyrical about Conroy’s ability many times and believe he has a big future, but that will only be with Town if he’s given a chance over the season.

After picking up a knee injury during the summer, Woolery finally made his return to the side and capped it off with the last goal of the game.

I’m a big believer that if Woolery is kept fit and given regular games over a couple of months he will show why Town paid £350,000 for him last summer.

He can be the prolific striker this side desperately needs this season.