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Cook: Toughest Period of My Management Career in Terms of Wins
Saturday, 28th Aug 2021 18:35

Town boss Paul Cook admitted he’s currently in the “toughest period of [his] management career in terms of wins in games” following the Blues’ 2-2 draw with AFC Wimbledon at Portman Road.

Dons sub Jack Rudoni netted from close range five minutes into injury time, the Blues having been 2-0 up until the 58th minute when Ben Heneghan pulled a goal back, Joe Pigott having given the Blues the lead from the spot and Wes Burns having made it 2-0.

Asked whether the draw felt more like a defeat, Cook said: “It just does, doesn’t it? You never try and kid supporters or people who come to a game, you understand when people get agitated that you’re not winning and then you look at the signs of the team.

“Like I keep saying to the lads, what we’ve done, we’ll do again, it’s football. And what we do, we have to learn from what we’ve done, and unfortunately at the minute we’re not.

“For whatever reason, and people will always point fingers of blame, I’m not like that, I don’t come out lambasting players and stuff. I think football’s educational.

“I think you could feel in the stadium at 2-0, it was a lovely atmosphere, it was jovial and everyone was euphoric. Unfortunately, when Wimbledon got the goal, you could feel the tension in the stadium come and you also feel the tension in the players’ decision-making.

“The best way to relieve pressure is to keep the ball and unfortunately at the minute, for a variety of reasons, we’re probably not doing as well as we should be, but we’ll keep going.”

Is it a confidence thing in terms of the players’ mindset? “Guys, we’re five games in. Again, we scored two goals at home and we haven’t won.

“We’ve had a lot of chances, we’ve got in a lot of great situations, but unfortunately Wimbledon are always going to put you under pressure late on and we’ve succumbed to what we’ve succumbed to.

“As a manager, you come away and you look, you analyse and you come back and you try and be better.

“One of the things for us is, especially with the new lads, I think everyone’s seen the quality of Hayden Coulson today, but he’s still not match fit. And these are the little things that we’ve got to get to. We’ve got to get our players up and running.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen with next week’s game at Wycombe, but the reality is we’re still in pre-season mode, we still need lads back fit and we need to train very, very hard in our pursuit of getting where we want to be.”

Town have conceded two goals in each of their five league games so far, which obviously makes it tough to win matches.

“It’s there, it’s ‘What have you learnt?’ What have you learned from three o’clock to five? What has surprised us in the game today? The reality is as we go away, what must we prepare for to get better,” Cook continued.

“If you could have written a script today to get 2-0 up in front of a fantastic home crowd, again we have to go on and dominate and win the game.

“Unfortunately, I don’t know the minute we conceded but it wasn’t long after our second goal. And confidence in football is key, especially at stadiums like this and when you play for big clubs.


“The reality is that our fans want to transmit positive energy and unfortunately if we don’t give them that energy to transmit, the energy will turn the opposite way and correctly so, and 100 per cent rightly so, and that’s something we’re just learning to manage at the minute.”

Town have now gone through the whole of August without a win, drawing 2-2 in all their three home league games, losing 2-1 away twice and exiting the Carabao Cup at the hands of Newport County.

“Just keep going,” added Cook, who has now won four games of 22 in charge of the Blues. “This is probably the toughest period of my management career in terms of wins in games.

“And I look at a new team and I look at the subs we’re making, taking off both full-backs in a game. I don’t take full-backs off, my substitutions are the front four because they’re knackered and we want to score more goals.

“At the minute, we can’t do that because of the fitness levels of the team and that’s due to Covid, squads, lateness [of signings], the list of the excuses is there. It’s just the reality and we need to now to get weeks in, which we’ve got, and train very, very hard.”

Asked whether he can understand why fans are moaning and groaning, Cook said: “If you’d gone home a minute before, you’d have been delighted and you’d have been happy, we’d have been up and running. A minute in football’s a long time.

“I understand what the supporters think, I understand the frustrations of people after five games that think the league is over and done with. But there’s no such thing in football.

“We’ve got to make small strides and small steps. Our small steps are very small at the minute, but the reality is that we look like we can score goals. The unfortunate thing is we also look like we can concede them, so we know what we’ve got to work on.”

Quizzed on next week’s game at Wycombe, which could be postponed with the Chairboys set to have three players called up allowing them to have the game called off, Cook said: “I don’t know, that’s Wycombe’s choice, isn’t it?”

Regarding Coulson’s performance, one of the positives from the display, he said: “You know yourselves, we’re a brand new team, we’re five games in, I get it.

“I get football, I’ve been managing long enough, I get what everybody wants. No one wants it more than me and the staff to see the game out, you can imagine how flat the dressing room is.

“But don’t make excuses, don’t be weak. We’re not that type of people, we have to work harder and we have to get more results and we have to start getting them a little bit quicker. That’s football.”

Asked whether the key period was after the second goal when Town should have kept the ball for five or 10 minutes, Cook said: “We spoke about it, you’ve hit the nail on the head, we don’t give our crowd enough time to enjoy the moment. We don’t give the opposition enough time to come on to us so we score again.

“The reality is when you go 2-0 up at home, we want to go and win 3-0 and 4-0, we don’t want to sit back.

“The third goal in the game was always going to be everything, credit to Wimbledon, they’ve scored it, they’re always going to put you under pressure with the balls, the corners, the set pieces and they’re also good in possession.

“And the reality is we’ve succumbed. You hold your hands up and go ‘No problem with that’ and we go away and we have to work harder.”

Regarding conceding twice from set pieces, he said: “He’s big, [Ben] Heneghan, they’ve also got [Ollie] Palmer, they’ve also got [Will] Nightingale, they’ve got some really big lads in there.

“We had Joe Pigott playing 90 minutes who’s not [played much] and I’m not going to make excuses for our lads because you have to see games out, irrespective that you have to be a streetwise team who can do one thing at one end and also be good at the other. And at the minute it’s quite clear that we’re not good at both ends.”

Town were without Macauley Bonne, who Cook says picked up an injury in training earlier in the week.

“He tweaked his hamstring on Tuesday in training and he was very, very much touch and go,” he said. “It was a similar one to Conor Chaplin at the start of the season and we haven’t seen Conor for four weeks.

“So we made the decision not to play Macauley because of that fact. Macauley will be back very, very quick, he’s had a scan, it’s nothing, it’s a very, very small issue, so he’ll be back right away. And obviously that was a big blow.”

Wes Burns limped off in the second half with an injury Cook says he has been suffering with for a number of weeks.

“Wes has been carrying a knock, Wes doesn’t train for large parts of the week and unfortunately it’s an achilles problem that he’s carrying and it’s an ongoing problem,” he said.

“And as you can see, it’s not helping us because we’re making substitutions again. It’s not an excuse by me because I know fans will go ‘What’s he done taking him off?’ We’re taking people off because they can’t last the game, and that’s not tactical, that’s just purely physical aspect that we’ve got to rectify.”

Wimbledon manager Mark Robinson was delighted with the point but frustrated that his team didn't get going until they were two goals down.

“We’ve just chatted in there and at 2-0 down you have seen what we are capable of,” Robinson told his club’s official website.

“The shackles came off and we started to play and it had nothing to do with the changes. We’ve got to have that belief from the start of the game.

“We let the players talk and [influential defender] Darius [Charles, who returned to the club this summer] was in there.

“The fans were incredible again and you show your appreciation, but we’ve got to realise why we found ourselves in that position of being 2-0 down. It was a mad five minutes and through some poor detail we left ourselves with a mountain to climb.

“I could see that the fans were excited, but we just want to excite them more. We are a work in progress — we know that — but we are only going to get better.

“Some of it is down to our youthfulness, but we’ve got to stamp our authority on games from the word go.

“After we went 2-0 down there was only one team in it, but every single one of our players has got to have that belief from the start.

“Some of the detail isn’t good enough, so we’ve had a great chat in there and that’s what we’ve got to improve upon.

“Ipswich have obviously got some really good players, but a lot of their attacks came from our basic errors, and they are the things we have to work on. That detail has cost us in a lot of games this season.”


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midastouch added 18:36 - Aug 28
2 nil up and we Cooked it up, 2 nil up and we Cooked it up!

We did our infamous ITFC "let's cock it up" in injury time routine...

We got found out, Cook, line and sinker!

Or should I say stinker?
11

Jesney_Havoc added 18:38 - Aug 28
All gong and no dinner.
0

martin587 added 18:44 - Aug 28
Very honest Paul but I feel your missing your friend at Wigan.Your backroom staff are very inexperienced and the captain for me does not seemed a motivator.Just hope I'm wrong.
13

Pencilpete added 18:47 - Aug 28
All im going to say is ....

If you keep conceding 2 goals a game like we are then we arnt going to win many games.

Thats the truth of it
18

Stato added 18:49 - Aug 28
At home to AFC Wimbledon I was honestly expecting Mr Demolition man to start Carroll in preference to Evans who doesn't look good enough at the moment to be in the starting 11
16

midastouch added 18:51 - Aug 28

Cookie Monster: Me Want 3 points (But Town Make Me Wait)
4

Oldozblue added 18:54 - Aug 28
Wimbledon players nowhere near as technically good footballers, but had spirit. Engine room died with Evans, manager' man, anonymous. Only Wombles player individually better was the goalkeeper. Thought Evans believed in small tight squads? Needs to strengthen his coaches not his playing squad.
6

Monkey_Blue added 18:55 - Aug 28
He's sly. He's blaming the players whilst claiming he's not. It's your fault Cook and I'm more convinced than ever that he has Narcissistic Personality Disorder
-1

ldnj added 18:58 - Aug 28
I'm not going to make excuses, but these are my excuses.
Lots of teams are new, have made wholesale changes but have had a better start. Lower League Newport played 11 different players for that game.
7

Monkey_Blue added 19:01 - Aug 28
He also sounds like a man who has BS'd the board on his ideas and now knows he's fluffed up. He's a grifter. I'm not calling for him to be sacked but long before the end of last season thought he was a mistake. Thing is, do you act quickly and decisively or do you wait until the disease has gone too far in the hope of recovery?
4

billlm added 19:01 - Aug 28
Liam richardson
2

Billysherlockblue added 19:03 - Aug 28
Come on cook. Evans not good enough at present . He looks laboured. Half hour to go and we start dropping off. No cover in front of our back line. We are being bullied off the ball waiting for a free. Come on guys harden up. Look at coulson. Burgess giving it their all and u see evans pussiying around the place. We were better than Wimbledon soccer wise but they had more heart. Tactics again were terrible when they changed theirs. 5 games in the relg. Zone now. Mr cook please change our midfield we were non existant when harper tired and evans strolling around the place playing safe ball the way he is facing. Come on town ye are so close keep it going. Dont get down. Next game up the ante a few per cent. Super blues forever 💙
9

Help added 19:04 - Aug 28
Ask yourself Cook, what would the Wigan manager do??
6

confederateblue added 19:08 - Aug 28
Great interview Cookie, unbelievable some people are calling for you to be sacked as the teams obviously gelling. Keep the faith, that win will come!
5

ringwoodblue added 19:10 - Aug 28
The most worrying thing I read from this post-match interview is we have a lot of players out injured who didn't play today and a fair few others who did play but are carrying knocks or can't play the full 96 mins. Our bench looked weak today too.

With a smaller squad than last season, we could get down to bare bones very quickly so why oh why is Cook talking about loaning out players like Dobra.

If results are going to improve, we have to have our best players fit and able to play right to the final whistle
16

Taricco_Fan added 19:10 - Aug 28
Welcome to Ipswich Town Football Club.
4

grinch added 19:10 - Aug 28
Coming out way before the players is a bit stupid Mr Cook shows a lack of purpose to the team. You are here to manage the team let them out first then follow afterwards. Why have an unfit KVY playing when Donacien has earned the right to play a full game then you could have used another sub up front or change that woeful central midfield. Yiu had all week to work with these players but still let in 2 x goals from set pieces poor poor poor. Time is running out some of your decision making is shocking capped by the possibility that young Dobra may go out on loan he would have been good to bring in today keep him we need players such as him who give 100% No excuses just an appalling start to this season we are in bottom four of Division 3 that is a sad fact Mr Cook you are taking us lower than we have been before
15

herfie added 19:12 - Aug 28
So many words, so few points. This has to be sorted. End of.
16

Billysherlockblue added 19:13 - Aug 28
Come on cook. Evans not good enough at present . He looks laboured. Half hour to go and we start dropping off. No cover in front of our back line. We are being bullied off the ball waiting for a free. Come on guys harden up. Look at coulson. Burgess giving it their all and u see evans pussiying around the place. We were better than Wimbledon soccer wise but they had more heart. Tactics again were terrible when they changed theirs. 5 games in the relg. Zone now. Mr cook please change our midfield we were non existant when harper tired and evans strolling around the place playing safe ball the way he is facing. Come on town ye are so close keep it going. Dont get down. Next game up the ante a few per cent. Super blues forever 💙
1

Billysherlockblue added 19:17 - Aug 28
One other point. Were letting DOBRA out on loan and bring on aulko who is terrible in the 2 games he has taken part in. Only my observation. Super blues forever 💙
6

Len_Brennan added 19:19 - Aug 28
Morecambe, Newport, Burton, Cheltenham, MK Dons & Wimbledon - 5 sides that have mostly been non-league until recent years & the other a poorly supported imposter, guilty of identity theft, and we can't beat any of them.
16

SickParrot added 19:20 - Aug 28
He questioned the character abd professionalism of the squad he inherited and said he would only sign players that would embrace the pressure of playing for a big club with promotion ambitions. Not that easy then?
10

bedsitfc added 19:22 - Aug 28
Is it still the players fault?

Asking for a friend
7

steve_holmes27 added 19:25 - Aug 28
The facts speak for themselves. He's won 4 games in 22. As we all know, 23 games is half a league season. There is no excuse for that sustained underperformance, only reasons. The reasons are Paul Cook is unable, both tactically and emotionally, to derive match winning performances. He's had two entirely different Ipswich teams, yet the results don't change. That leaves only one logical change left to make....
10

hyperbrit added 19:26 - Aug 28
these results will not have escaped the attention of the owners
15


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