Paul Holleran gives his thoughts on the 4-1 defeat at Telford:
‘It ended up being a very frustrating afternoon for us. If I’m being honest I think Telford played the conditions better than us with their direct play. The pitch was nearly as bad as last season which made it really difficult, but the fact that they’ve gone high and long into the front two all afternoon... I think in the physical battle, we’ve come off second best in that area.
Frustrations with the man in middle started very early on because obviously there were so many incidents that went against us. Little things, like the build up to their first two goals. We’re disappointed, and after having such a good start in the game. We were well in the game for long periods throughout, but the underlying problem for us is that we’ve conceded some poor goals. You look at Brendon Daniels’ strike (Telford’s first goal) - you can’t argue that it’s a great strike but we’ve had two chances to clear our lines, we’re not getting enough distance on them, it’s just sloppiness really.
‘From the word go every 50/50 decision went against. I asked the Referee at half time if he could deal with the theatrics of certain players, perhaps have a word with them. It makes it difficult for our players because they get frustrated, the Referee doesn’t know what to do, he doesn’t know what’s a mistimed tackle or what’s a dive, but if he uses his yellow card we all know where we are then don’t we.’
Second half it’s turned into a decent game….end to end, and you’re thinking this could go either way really, but sadly from our point of view it’s not a great goal for us to concede again, their third one. We had some tired legs on that pitch and were forced into making substitutions, bringing off the likes of Junior and Kieran. Connor Gudger was struggling as well. I could have made about five substitutions. I think with Connor’s sending off - I had a good view of it - I think he’s lost his footing on the pitch, his position isn’t great, but as he’s gone down to the floor he’s basically stuck his left leg up to try make some connection on the ball. There is some kind of contact on the player, but it’s minimal. Obviously that then causes you another problem. The players…..were frustrated, the afternoon hasn’t gone the way we wanted it to, and sadly it then looks like Jamie Hood has made a bit of a reckless tackle on the far side. As a group we’ve got to have more control and discipline, there’s no doubt about that. We let the situation get to us. It’s probably the first time this season, but we’ve got to be better than that. We have to manage it better, even on a day when things aren’t going your way, you feel that lots of decisions aren’t going your way.. You’ve somehow got to manage that.
I think to be honest Telford played the conditions much better than we did, and in the end were deserved winners, there’s no ifs and buts about that. It’s like when we went to Alfreton and they bombarded us for 90 minutes. You’ve got to be big and strong and get plenty of first contacts and second contacts. If you don’t do that in this league you’re in trouble, and that’s what happened, but the bottom line is we didn’t deal with the direct play and physicality of Telford and we paid the ultimate price for it but obviously there were lots of other things out of our control, but at this level you expect a more consistent and certainly a more fairer performance from those in charge.
The sending offs won’t affect Tuesday (at home to Brackley), but we’ll have to wait and see how he writes up Connor’s sending off. We’ll be having a look at the video of the match today, but as we’ve already learnt this season there is little point in appealing unless it is 100% crystal clear that a mistake has been made, then they won’t go against it.’
