Ruaidhri Higgins feels some of the recent criticism of his Derry City team has been "over the top" after watching his side maintain their early title push with a 3-0 win over Dundalk on Monday night.
The Candystripes followed up consecutive 1-0 away wins over Drogheda United and Bohemians with another three points at the Ryan McBride Brandywell Stadium and that run of form has Derry second in the SSE Airtricity League table, two points adrift of Shamrock Rovers.
Higgins, who led the club to FAI Cup glory last season as well as a runner-up finish in the league, was delighted with the performance against Dundalk.
"It's an excellent performance from start to finish, bar maybe a 10 minute period before half-time where they got a bit of control," he said.
"But they've been on a brilliant run, Dundalk, credit to them but I thought tonight we put in a comprehensive display and deserved a win.
"It was brilliant. You have to say Jordan (McEneff) has been in and out and he's had to be patient at times and he gets a great goal.
"Brandon (Kavanagh) has had to be even more patient and he showed his class. So we have to learn from the previous two Monday nights here at the Brandywell where we were flat.
"We made four changes, Dundalk made four changes but I thought we looked really fresh and we had fresh legs in the front four which was really important to us."
Derry have the best away record in the league and Monday night's win was only their third at home this season with all three of their defeats also coming at the Brandywell.
That disparity between results on their own synthetic surface and on the road had contributed to criticism of their start to the campaign but Higgins feels such sentiments were harsh.
"I thought it was a really good display and to be honest, our players have come under a lot of criticism in recent times from people and rightly so to a certain extent but I thought a lot of it was over the top, particularly that weekend here when we lost the two in four days," he said.
"We weren't good, I accept that but what this team has done over the last year or so, I thought a lot of the criticism was over the top.
"There's only way to respond to that and that's by winning football matches, keeping clean sheets and fighting for each other."
Meanwhile, Dundalk head coach Stephen O'Donnell lamented the "poor goals" his side conceded in a result that ended a four-game winning streak.
"Disappointing. We had our moments at 2-0 down, we'd a couple of really good chances that might have made a game of it but on the whole, it's a little bit disappointing in regards to what we brought to the table from a physical aspect," he said.
"We've been on a really good run but you're going to have disappointments. It's a disappointment tonight, a bit of frustration and obviously a bit of anger but we'll go again and we've a quick a turnaround with Bohemians on Friday."
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