Neil Warnock spoke at Cardiff City Stadium following the Bluebirds’ 4-2 victory over Fulham on Saturday afternoon.
City put in a superb performance in the Welsh capital, fighting back from André Schürrle's wonder-goal through Josh Murphy and Bobby Decordova-Reid's strikes.
Despite another setback in the shape of Ryan Sessegnon's equaliser, second-half goals from Callum Paterson and Kadeem Harris secured City's first victory of the 2018/19 Premier League campaign.
“Today, we started so well,” said Neil following the final whistle. “We had a few knock-backs and showed a lot of character after starting so well and seeing a world-beater go in from that distance – that’d be enough to knock anybody’s confidence.
“But once again, we were right back in it, carried on and deservedly went back in front. We conceded another sloppy goal and we’ll have to eliminate that if we want to survive - we know that. I felt we were on the front foot for the whole game and deserved to win. We were ready for it and said that our season starts today in the lead-up.
“It takes time to settle in the Premier League, because it’s a big step-up and everything was positive today. There are a lot more clubs with bigger expenditure than us and there are four or five that I think we can pip, so we’ve just got to keep going. We need to try to entertain and I said that last year – we want to entertain and we’ve got the players that can do that.”
The Gaffer went on to reveal his delight with Aron Gunnarsson’s return performance, before praising his City troops and the supporters alike.
“Gunnarsson was superb,” continued Warnock. “I asked him to give it 65 or 70 minutes and he was fantastic – we’ve missed his presence.
"Everybody was fantastic though, especially Paterson. Many have said that he’s not a centre-forward, but a lot of strikers wouldn’t have scored that goal, so I’m delighted for him. All you can do is your best and he put in a tremendous effort.
“Bobby Reid and Josh Murphy were also outstanding. They’ve taken time to settle in the Premier League and they’re both maturing. Bobby’s contribution was excellent and Murphy took his goal well – he was running on empty!
“[Víctor] Camarasa was also brilliant and Kadeem has been like that all week in training. He’s been scoring goals for fun at the back post and we’ve encouraged him to do that in matches, so that goal will not do him any harm. It’s good to see four different scorers.
“The crowd have been unbelievable all season and Cardiff City Stadium is an amazing place. We haven’t had any stick whatsoever from the fans for having not won a game until now, and it’s nice to give them something like that today, because they deserve it.”