Hinshelwood explains the changes made in City's 3-1 win over Darlington

ADAM HINSHELWOOD explained the changes made to his York City team in Saturday's 3-1 win over Darlington, and why he made the decision to rest Ollie Pearce.

Pearce has proven to be a shrewd bit of business in the Summer, after scoring an impressive 14 goals and assisting four in 21 appearances so far this season.

His efforts has seen the striker rise to the top of the National League scoring charts, with York currently leading the way in the fifth tier too.

But with a match against Darlington in Saturday’s FA Trophy entry at the LNER Community Stadium, which City progressed in with a 3-1 win, Pearce was rested with Hinshelwood wary of any potential injuries.

Hinshelwood also explained the absences of both Malachi Fagan-Walcott and Ryan Fallowfield, with the latter initially due to start the match, and spoke on Adam Crookes’ injury.

“We wanted to give him recovery, obviously he’s going to be a big player for us,” Hinshelwood confirmed.

“It’s a tough one, we want to keep momentum going but then if Ollie had started today and had gotten a nasty injury, I would have been kicking myself for that.

“It’s trying to get that balance right, we wanted to get Crookesy [Adam Crookes] some minutes but obviously he didn’t last too long.

“It’s these conditions where you’re going to need everybody. I’m disappointed with Crookesy, but he thinks it’s just a spasm in his hip so it’s nothing too sinister.

“Mal’s [Malachi Fagan-Walcott] got a bit of a problem with the top of his foot at the minute, he’s just been managing it so we thought that the extra time for him to manage that.

“Ryan Fallowfield went down ill this [Saturday] morning, he was meant to start the game so it was a bit of a predicament.

“We came thought all of those challenges and got the win, that was the most important thing.”

Progress in the FA Trophy means that York are into the fourth round of the FA Trophy, with Hinshelwood previously speaking on his hopes of reaching the final in the competition.

The boss remains aware that rotation will be needed in the latter stages of the competition, and was also impressed with the returning Billy Chadwick, whose loan spell at Boston United came to an end to last week.

Hinshelwood added: “It certainly is [an opportunity], we know that no matter what team we come up against, we’ll be competitive against them if we’re at our best.

“That’s what we’re trying to find, we have a big squad of 20 players and Billy Chadwick came back and I thought he was excellent today.

“It’s another one added, we’re going to need all of these players, especially if we want to do well in the cup competitions.

“It gives them some minutes and an opportunity to showcase what they can do.”