Peterborough United's man-of-the-match on a strong personal comeback as well an impressive team fightback

It’s no secret Posh tried to offload the experienced goalkeeper during the January transfer window to help finance more general team-building plans. But Steer remained, trained hard and won his place back at the start of February for the first time since mid-October. Last night he saved two penalties in a shootout success to win the Sky Sports man-of-the-match award and help Posh to Wembley for the Vertu Trophy Final for the second season in a row.

Posh came from 2-0 down with late goals from Malik Mothersille and Brad Ihionvien to draw 2-2 and force a penalty shoot which was won 4-2. Steer saved penalties taken by experienced Wrexham players Paul Mullin and Elliot Lee.

Steer slipped into cliche at the start of post-match interviews with BBC Radio Cambridgeshire and the Posh Plus service before settling down to explain his penalty-saving preparation and to praise the quality and spirit of a set of young outfield players.

"Football is a funny old game as they say,” Steer said. “Decisions are made in football that you just have to accept, but I knuckled down in January, worked hard, trained well and when the window shut I made sure I gave the manager a decision to make. I was lucky enough to get back in the side and I’m pleased with how it’s gone so far and obviously last night was great. Football changes quickly and you must always be ready to play.

"It was all about getting to Wembley. It didn’t matter how you played, but we actually played very well anyway. It would have been easy for heads to drop after we went 2-0 down on the pitch and in the crowd, but we stuck at it, kept pushing and the belief was brilliant. We always believe we can score goals and in the end we got our reward. It would also have been easy for our supporters to get downhearted in the first half after travelling all that way, but they didn’t. The noise they made all game was brilliant.

"As a goalkeeper you don’t really have a lot to lose in a penalty shootout, but at the same time you don't want the score to get to 10-10 and you haven’t saved any! You want to make saves to take some of the pressure off our takers and Dan our analyst prepared a dossier on their players which I studied in the team hotel which proved really useful. Saving the first penalty was a real boost and saving a second one was very pleasing.

"Fair play to our lads as well for putting their hands up and taking penalties. One or two of them missed in training the day before, but they still wanted to take one. It can be a long lonely walk from the halfway line, and the game is on TV, so there’s a chance you start second guessing yourself, but I made sure I spoke to them all. Hopefully seeing a friendly face helped them.

"it was a great feeling at the end. I was elated. Wrexham are very good at what they do and they were happy to let us have the ball in front of them. It was tough to concede twice in quick succession. It can knock the stuffing out of you, but it was a semi-final with the winners going to Wembley which is one big carrot. I’m delighted for the lads and for the coaching staff. A lot of our players haven’t played at Wembley so I hope they all get on.

"But League games take precedence now and all our focus has to be on beating Shrewsbury on Saturday.”