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Hakan Hayrettin kept it brief at half-time as Maidstone saw off Chichester in the FA Cup.
Stones boss Hayrettin appeared early for the second half and continued to talk tactics with assistant manager Terry Harris in the dugout while the players stayed back in the dressing room.
His side had laboured in a goalless first half against their Isthmian South East opponents and Hayrettin gave the players time to take on board what he’d said.
It worked, with a much-improved second-half display ending in a 3-1 victory and a place in Monday lunchtime’s third qualifying round draw.
“If anyone’s seen it I do it quite often now,” said Hayrettin.
“Let them absorb what I said, let them get on with it.
“We’ve told them what we think.
“We know they’re a good team, we’ve had them watched twice, they’re a very good team.
“Come on, we’ve given you all the information, you need to absorb that and do better than what you did first half.
“If it’s a case that you’re not listening we’ll have to change it but I don’t think it was, I think it was more that they didn’t expect Chichester to come out the way they did.”
Joan Luque scored three minutes into the second half and while City levelled, substitute Christie Pattisson and Roarie Deacon ended City’s hopes.
Hayrettin pointed to game-changing moments, with Pattisson’s goal coming a minute after Stones captain George Elokobi almost put through his own net.
“We’re not playing a team that’s no good, we’re playing a team that’s half-decent and we had to do the right things in the second half to get a result,” said Hayrettin.
"Take nothing away from them, they made it a difficult game for us and they’re a very good outfit.
“But the second-half performance was good and in these games the tie’s always a leveller, not the pitch, not the opposition, the tie, and you don’t know what’s going to happen.
“Everyone put a shift in second half.
"Alfie Pavey missed a penalty, it could have been game over even then, but they made a hard game of it for us and in the end we had our just rewards and should have scored more.
“At the moment every time we make a substitution we seem to get it right and it worked again with Christie coming on.
“I’m pleased for everybody, pleased for the club, we’re into the next round.
"More importantly we keep our unbeaten run going and I said to them, 'You don’t want to be losing here, there’s going to be regrets.'
“If you’re going to lose, lose by playing well and second half we did play well.”
