NORWICH City showed 'real bottle' to notch their fifth win in a row with a 2-0 triumph at Leeds United on Tuesday, according to manager Alex Neil.

Jonny Howson, against his boyhood club, and Graham Dorrans in stoppage time were the men who struck the vital goals in a combative and determined second half performance by the Canaries.

It keeps them in the top two ahead of Friday's promotion battle with Middlesbrough, and Neil heaped praise on his players after the final whistle at Elland Road.

"How we won the game spoke volumes about the squad, their togetherness and how much it means to them," he told Norwich City TV.

"We weren't at our best in the first half, but the response in the second half was excellent.

"I posed a few questions to them in terms of how much we actually wanted it. You've got to ultimately do enough.

"I think they answered the questions and more, all the credit should go to them. In the second half I thought they showed some real bottle."

Reflecting on the six points haul from the two away matches since the weekend, Neil outlined his measure of his team's achievement before pushing focus to Friday's televised game.

"Anybody looking at the last two games for us, especially with them being so close together, we knew it was going to be tough," he commented.

"The run they've been on since I came in, it's really difficult to replicate. We've got three left and we've got to try and win them as well. If we do that, I'm more than confident that we'll be in the Premier League.

"I don't think any game is going to get any bigger than the one on Friday night. We need to make sure the place is rocking for the players, and hopefully we'll go and give a real good account of ourselves."

Lewis Grabban was originally among the substitutes at Elland Road but was forced to pull out of the matchday squad during the warm-up, with Neil adding: "He just felt that it (his ankle) wasn't quite right in the warm up, it was causing him a wee bit of pain. We just had to make sure that we took precautions on that."

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