McCarthy: Good, Solid, Disciplined, Hard-Working and We Put the Ball in the Net Saturday, 19th Aug 2017 18:20 Blues boss Mick McCarthy hailed a “a good, solid, disciplined, hard-working” display from his side with the added bonus of Martyn Waghorn and Joe Garner “putting the ball in the net”. McCarthy admits he’s surprised that Brentford end the afternoon bottom of the table with only a point to show from their four Championship games. “Let’s be honest about it, they’re a very good side, how they’re bottom of the league with only one point is beyond me,” he said. “In the first half we got away with a few things, they started really well. I accepted that they were going to have a lot of the ball and I’d set up to sit back a bit, knowing full well we’d catch them on the break if they gave it away. “With the strike force we’ve got we can do that. But it took a rearguard action from four full-backs, very stoically they were doing it. “We’ve got away with it but the second half was much better, they’ve not really penetrated as much. All-round, good, solid, disciplined, hard-working and then the end bit, which we hadn’t got last year, is putting the ball in the net.” He added: “They’ve probably had 1,796,000 passes and we’ve probably had 212 or something, I don’t know. “I had to set up that way, if we’d have gone chasing them they’d have played around us, we’d have got beaten, so it was a matter of keeping solid and we have got a good counter-attacking team. That happened at Millwall on Tuesday, the front five were a really threat.” McCarthy was delighted with goalscorers Waghorn and Garner - “Two good signings, they’re doing everything I’d expect of them and more” - summer signings from Rangers, who have netted four and three goals respectively. Told his side had scored nine of their 12 shots on target in the league this season, he joked: “Not sure we had 12 shots in the league last year.” After the less than favourable songs which were sung about him last season, the Portman Road crowd returned to chanting ‘super Mick McCarthy’ during the second half. “I prefer that but I treat it equally with the same contempt as I do the boos because that can come back pretty quick,” he reflected. “It shows how fickle football is. I’ve always said if we’re winning games that will change. I’m more concerned that the club is on the up genuinely. “Because I will leave, at some stage I will be gone from here, but it’s the club that really counts and I hated it last year when ‘everything was wrong with the club’, and I didn’t like that. “And it ends up being a horrible atmosphere. I’m not bothered how many pies, how many pints, how many kids, I don’t give a shite about everything else in the football club, if you’re not winning games and you’re playing badly, we’re all wrong, we don’t get anything [right]. “Genuinely, it’s not about me, I’m delighted for the lads that they’re enjoying playing a great atmosphere, so that’s lovely.” Regarding makeshift centre-half pair Jordan Spence and Jonas Knudsen’s performances, he added: “They kept a clean sheet, that tells a lot about it. I wasn’t worried about that today but I would have hated to have gone to Millwall with that back four. “Pretty much there was only one difference, but we had Chambo in the team who will compete and make sure they all stay up. "It was going to be a different game and having four full-backs who were quick and lively and mobile and cover the ground quickly suited us playing against that team, to be quite honest. “Whether I’d pick them if I’d got all my centre-backs fit that’s another matter, but it didn’t do us any harm today. I thought they were good.” Knudsen in particular seemed to thrive in the role and took on the responsibility of the post-match fist pump in front of the Sir Bobby Robson Stand. “If you look back at things I’ve always said he would make a left-sided centre-back,” McCarthy continued. “He loves defending. He outs his body in the way of things. “He’s great, he gets forward, he puts crosses in when he’s playing at full-back, but he loves defending.” The result sees the Blues climb to second on goal difference behind Cardiff City, managed by another veteran boss Neil Warnock, a currently unfashionable type of manager. “Two old farts who know f***-all about the game!” McCarthy joked. “I’ll have to get my iPad out now.” Brentford manager Dean Smith felt the afternoon was an all too familiar tale for his team. “We’ve had a little bit of déjà vu again," he said. "In the first half we could have been out of sight. I thought our play was very good, we created opportunities, we were camped in their half. “We gave a sloppy pass away in midfield, they broke into the box, the ball ricocheted to their lad and he tucked it away. “Even with that goal we had enough chances to get back in the game and should have been comfortably leading at half-time. The word is frustration at the moment. “In the second half I asked the lads to keep doing the same because I felt we were so on top, then Harlee Dean gets fouled, the referee doesn’t give it, they break and get a corner and we don’t deal with the corner well enough. “I think after that I think they sat in their half, broke things up and we didn’t have the nous. I thought we were very sloppy on the ball in the second half.” Did he feel his side didn't get the rub of the green from referee Oliver Langford? "I’ll have to be careful with what I say here. I certainly don’t think Neal Maupay got protection in the first half. “I had to bring him off in the end because he got whacked all over the place. He’s a lad who has come over from a different league in France, but he’s got a little bit about him. “I still don’t know how you can go through the back of someone without a freekick being given but it’s one of those things.”
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