Cook: An Absolutely Shocking Performance Saturday, 2nd Oct 2021 17:53 Town boss Paul Cook pulled no punches in his assessment of the Blues’ 2-1 defeat away against his old club Accrington Stanley. Second-half goals from Colby Bishop and Harry Pell saw Stanley to the three points after Macauley Bonne had given Town a 38th-minute lead with his eighth of the season. Cook, a one-time manager and player with the Lancastrians, was asked whether he felt it was a disappointment. “That’s an understatement, isn’t it?” the clearly frustrated Blues manager said. “We didn’t turn up, apart from Macauley Bonne, again with an outstanding finish, I don’t think we had a player, possibly Janoi Donacien maybe a little bit, I don’t think we had a player who could come out from it with any credit. “It was an absolutely shocking performance, I didn’t see it coming. I thought we took the lead against the run of play. Accrington had so much more hunger and desire, which I knew they’d have and you’d expect our quality to come through. At no point in the game did that happen.” Did the performance come as a surprise? “Lads, you watch us the same as me. Football’s a funny game, just the minute you think you’re starting to do something well, it bites you. And today we had to match Accrington, which we didn’t do, we had to run harder than them, we had to work harder than them, and we never did. “And you can debate tactics, formations, players, if you don’t win individual battles, you won’t win a game and we didn’t win many on that pitch.” He added: “I always think if we’d have left today with a point, you’d be going home happy because you’d think we’d probably pinched a point away from home. “You can make excuses about anything you want. Listen, Accrington have travelled for two games, to Morecambe, to Oxford and they ran every blade of grass today. They were on every second ball, they were hungry, they were off the front foot and unfortunately for us, we went under, and that’s a horrible thing to say as a manager.” Cook said it was particularly disappointing given Tuesday’s performance as they beat Doncaster 6-0, the third game in a three-match unbeaten run which appeared to see the Blues build up some momentum. “We thought we did, three games unbeaten, hadn’t conceded goals,” he reflected. “And to be fair to both teams today, there were no chances in the game. It wasn’t a great spectacle, it wasn’t a great game of football but Accrington deserved to win, make no bones about it.” A wake-up call for one or two? “It has to be. It’s hard for me because I’ll never make excuses for players because I’m not like that. We’re screaming for consistency from our players so we know what we get. “Today we lost battles with players that I wouldn’t expect players to lose, which is what really disappoints you.” Does he feel for fans, who travelled to the North-West? “The supporters are great, they’re amazing. The turn up, they travel, they’ve had false dawns, they’ve had disappointments, again it’s part of your journey. “Today we were really, really disappointing and that’s poor from myself, the staff, the players, especially when we’ve offered so much, we’re going to open teams up and we’ve got good players. “I didn’t feel we worked hard enough in the game today and our players will be under no illusions that it won’t be accepted.” Asked whether he felt the display has to be a one-off, Cook responded: “Well, we’ll see, won’t we? We’ll just wait and see.” Cook says he’s not going to have the squad in for extra training on Sunday: “I’m not like that, I won’t be threatening them like that. Football’s about habits and repetition and when they go on the pitch. “We never took control of the game today, at no point did we take control where you felt ‘Now’s our chance, we’re in the ascendency’. We huffed and we puffed and we faded away.” The result and performance clearly hurt the Town boss: “It kills, but listen, it’s footie. I’m more experienced now, it takes you up and down. “Today, they scored just after half-time when you know quite well if we can see out 10 or 15 minutes, you think our subs bench can come on and influence the game. “We end up then making subs that we weren’t planning on making because the game’s just going away from us, and it shouldn’t have done that. “On the flip side of that, you must credit Accrington, they were very, very good today, they showed to everyone how hard a place it is to come and they’re a great credit to John Coleman and his staff.” He added: “Today’s disappointing because we just wanted to keep our momentum going, just keep moving forward and we’ve taken a step back now where realistically where we expected to hopefully take a step forward. “But you’ve got to let your disappointment sink in, I’m disappointed, I’m sick because I never saw it coming. I really expected us to play well today. I’m not saying I’d thought we’d win, but I thought people would enjoy watching us playing. I didn’t enjoy watching us playing.” The display was a reminder that Town have to earn the right to play their football against less fancied League One sides. “You guys know, we knew what we were going to walk into today, our lads were under no illusions,” he said. “We never won a second ball, we never won a battle, we were playing in the wrong areas of the pitch, every bad decision you make, we made, and unfortunately that’s what you get.” He continued: “Just keep going, it’s hard because you’re on a little three-game run where we’ve looked defensively strong, and I don’t think we’ve looked defensively weak today, if I’m being truthful, we just never looked good in the game, and that’s the thing that hurts the most.” Accrington boss John Coleman was unsurprisingly delighted with the victory following Tuesday's 5-1 defeat at Oxford. “I was delighted with the way they played,” Coleman told the Lancashire Telegraph. “[Ipswich] had one chance in the first half and scored and we thought it was a foul in the build-up to their goal. “We said to the lads at half-time they had to be more of a threat going forward and we scored a good goal to get back level while our keeper didn’t really have a save to make. “Then Harry [Pell] was in the right place at the right time for the winner. We changed the formation and came up with the right formula. You don’t always get it right but today we did. “We have conceded stupid goals recently but we were tight at the back with Seamus Conneely and David Morgan outstanding, and giving us a solid base in midfield. I also have to mention Ethan Hamilton who was superb. “This win is a small step for us but we have been good at home this season.”
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