BURNLEY manager Brian Laws has targeted back-to-back Championship wins for the first time this season, after praising his side’s character in coming back from behind to beat Watford.

The Clarets took a first-half lead through Chris Iwelumo’s ninth goal of the season, but trailed 2-1 before the hour.

A double substitution changed the course of the game, as Ross Wallace came off the bench to equalise four minutes after his introduction and then have a hand in earning a match-winning penalty, converted by Graham Alexander.

After seeing his players perform well without maximum reward in previous games, Laws admitted: “We had a little bit of a role reversal here. We didn’t play as well, but I thought we dug deep.”

And the Burnley boss accepted points were more important than performances at this stage, as his side climbed back into the top six on goal difference with a sixth home win of the season.

“Performances will come because we have good players, but three points here was vital,” he said.

“We deserved the win for our mentality, because it was a real test for us, our character and mental strength.

“We scored the first goal, but the equaliser was very poor from our point of view, and it rocked us a little bit.

“We weren’t at the races from that period.

“I said at half-time we needed to do better with the ball, get down the sides of them better, and sometimes managers make changes and it doesn’t work, but it worked,” added Laws, who replaced Wade Elliott and Iwelumo with Wallace and Steven Thompson.

“Credit to the subs coming on, they changed the game and won it for us.

“It’s hard to go on when the game isn’t flowing well, the ball was hardly on the floor - it wasn’t that the teams wanted to do that, it jut happened that way.

“There was a lot of heading in the game, it was like head tennis at times, but once we got the ball down and got it out wide, we were causing them all sorts of problems.

“Our combination work was great, and, eventually, getting balls in the box was going to be a problem for them.”

Laws switched from a 4-3-3 formation to 4-4-2 when Burnley trailed, with Rodriguez partnering Iwelumo up front before Thompson’s introduction.

And it was through Rodriguez going down under defender Martin Taylor’s push as he controlled Wallace’s ball into the box that Alexander was given the opportunity to clinch it from the spot.

Watford disputed the decision, but after conceding a controversial late equaliser at Norwich last week, Laws said: “We’ve had some horrendous decisions against us, and this was justified.

“Rodriguez chested the ball down and got barged in the back.

“You can’t do that.

“I think it was the right decision, and Grezza stood tall and smashed it in.”