JOHN Coleman says he sympathises with Dave Artell as the Crewe boss grapples with moulding a new side.

The Accrington boss was generous in victory as Stanley secured their third win of the campaign courtesy of a first-half finish from former Alex loanee Michael Nottingham.

Crewe's form is in stark contrast with the Lancashire outfit's bright start to their League One campaign, having lost three out of their four opening fixtures.

The August schedule has been tough, and with new players to bed in as well a sickness bug rampaging through the squad, their poor results may come as no great surprise.

Certainly not to Coleman, who is more than familiar with having to rebuild teams at the Wham Stadium during his 20 years with the club.

"I expect Crewe to pick up a lot of points at home, they're an attractive football team. They're going through a little bit of a transition with players with contract situations not being resolved and losing players. We know from first hand how that can damage your club, damage your morale," said the Stanley manager.

"I feel for big Dave and I feel for the [Crewe] fans because the fans want the better players playing. They want them to go for big money so they can improve the infrastructure of the ground, the team and the club. And then they can get in players to replace them.

"Dave is in a limbo and I've been there loads of times and it is difficult to cope with."

At least the Alex appear almost clear of the norovirus bug, although Owen Dale was absent for the second consecutive game.

Among the two changes to the side losing at Oxford in midweek was the return of a well-again Shaun MacDonald to the middle of the park. While Chris Porter was drafted in to lead the line with Mikael Mandron shunted across to the left flank and Callum Ainley dropping into midfield.

But frontman Chris Long has been sidelined with a knee injury and Donervon Daniels hadn't trained during the week, although he was needed on the bench with Artell mindful of the imposing height in Stanley's ranks.

Crewe found Coleman's men hard to handle at set pieces and it was from a Sean McConville corner they fell behind in the 17th-minute with Dave Richards under heavy pressure gloving Ross Sykes' header away to safety and defender Nottingham lashing in the weak clearance.

Sykes headed another McConville corner onto the bar in a first-half in which Stanley had the upper hand, although a powerful drive from skipper Luke Murphy forced James Trafford into an agile stop to keep the ball out of the bottom corner.

After the break Murphy went close again when he almost caught Trafford off his line with a lofted effort from wide left of goal.

Oli Finney came on for Manchester City teenager Ben Knight, who endured a tough home debut, and forced another City loanee, Trafford, into more action, including a super save to turn the midfielder's low snapshot around the post in stoppage time.

Referee Darren Drysdale was in a card-happy mood – in all brandishing 10 yellow cards, one of which was a second for Luke Offord for pulling back sub Joel Mumbongo.

Despite falling down to 10 men in the 89th minute, Crewe were still pushing for an equaliser in the closing minutes, although Mumbongo wasted two late chances on the counter attack to kill the game, shooting wide on both occasions.

Artell said: "Accrington had a couple of chances in the last five minutes, but the better chances in the game probably fell to us.

"It was a soft goal. They've got tall players and that is how they set up, but we'd worked on that.

"It was a foul on the keeper, but it shouldn't take away from the fact we should have defended it [the corner] better."

Crewe: Richards; Ramsay (McFadzean), Offord, Thomas, Adebisi; Murphy, MacDonald (Griffiths), Ainley; Knight (Finney), Porter, Mandron. Subs: Jaaskelainen, Sass-Davies, Daniels, Lundstram

Accrington: Trafford; Sykes, Nottingham (Perritt), Rodgers; Pritchard, Butcher, Morgan, Pell (Mumbongo), McConville; Bishop, Charles (Sherring). Subs: Savin, Procter, Nolan