MARK Cooper was not happy with his Swindon Town side’s performance, despite them picking up their first win since the opening day.

Fabien Robert scored the only goal on a scorching afternoon at Roots Hall. The game itself was of little note, aside from the injury to captain Nathan Thompson, who limped off after 10 minutes clutching his groin.

Lawrence Vigouroux excelled late on as Swindon mounted a stoic defensive action to ensure they returned to Wiltshire with all three points. One save in particular from the Liverpool loanee, denying Joe Pigott from close-range, was outstanding.

The win continued Town’s unbeaten start to their League One campaign, but did not impress the Town boss.

After Tuesday’s dramatic draw with Port Vale, Cooper declared himself very pleased with the performance put in by his players. At Roots Hall, he was less satisfied.

“That’s what makes football an amazing game,” said the County Ground chief. “We played as badly as we did, kept a clean sheet and won 1-0.

“It just shows you’ve got to take these bits of fortune when they come along. We got a bit of bad luck the other night and it seems to have evened itself up.

“We weren’t at our best.

“We turned the ball over too many times. Too often there were positions where we could break and finish the game - instead we turned the ball straight over and gave it back to them.

“We didn’t play with any control, which is what we have to do with the players we have.

“We’ve not been a team, since I’ve been here, that’s ground results out because we’re not set up for that, but we ground one out here.”

Raphael Branco performed admirably at right-back once Thompson departed the field, but Swindon never fully found their fluency.

“Obviously, the injury knocked us,” Cooper added. “We were trying to find that tactical foundation as to how best resurrect ourselves.

“We fought with a couple of systems and permutations until we settled with Rafa (Branco) as probably the best option at right-back.

“We defended manfully at the end when we had to. We need to be better with our possession because that’s what we’re about.

“We’d have been delighted if we were told we were going to get that kind of return (eight points from four games). It could have been more, it could have been less. We’ll take it and move on.”