After his side suffered a last-gasp defeat away at Bournemouth in the Carabao Cup 3rd Round, Rovers boss Tony Mowbray reflected on a game that saw his side fight back from 2-0 down but ultimately, end the game with 10 men.
“The defeat is difficult to take, having played so well over the course of the 90 minutes. I’ve just told the lads in the dressing room, that the late goals have to stop, and I’m pretty sure they will with time. The sending off to Derrick (Williams) was a bit freakish, which ultimately led to their goal, because I’m sure Derrick would have helped us defend the corner. We’re disappointed to be out of the cup, but we have to switch our focus back to the league, which is the most important competition.
“The character shown today and the way the lads have fought back from 2-0 down, doesn’t surprise me. I thought we were always in the game, despite being a bit tentative during the first 20 minutes. We talked before the game about playing aggressively, and that showed in the early goal that we scored which was ruled out for offside. We’ve come up against a good team tonight, and I thought we had a good grip on the game. The decision to award them a penalty was an embarrassment, but that’s football at the end of the day. We have to move on now. We’re out of the cup after a brilliant effort and performance against a side that has cost a lot of money. This game shows that I can trust a lot of the lads who haven’t had the game time that they may have liked.
“I thought Craig (Conway) was good. He worked extremely hard and performed well, especially after having to deal with an issue in his personal life, before tonight. Craig has been putting in performances like that for a while at this football club and I’m delighted for him, especially after his goal, because I’m always moaning at him, saying that he has to create more chances, or score more goals in order to be in with a chance to get into the team.
“After Adam (Armstrong) scored the penalty, we definitely had the momentum to go on and win the tie. Although they brought some of their main players on, I still felt that we had enough about us, to nick it off them and complete the turnaround. I would have taken penalties, to be honest, because they’re a lottery and had we lost through them, I wouldn’t have had a lot to criticise. I’ve always been a manager who looks at the performance, rather than the result. If the performances every week, are similar to tonight, we’ll do well in the Championship, I’m sure.
“The red card was simply bizarre, because Derrick has just gone and picked the ball up. If Derrick slipped, he should have tried to get his body in-between their man and the ball, in order to force a free-kick, rather than simply pick the ball up. That decision was made in a split second, and ultimately it has cost the team the tie, and has cost Derrick participation in our next game against Forest. I thought, despite the madness at the end, that Derrick had a good game after he found his feet a bit. He started the game poorly and wasn’t engaging enough when it mattered, but as he grew into the game, he improved.
“I thought overall, the team functioned pretty well. We changed formation from something we don’t play, into something we do. The formation, as I’ve been telling the lads, doesn’t really matter, as long as the principles of how we play are there, we’ll be fine. Tonight, we consistently altered the pressure we played at and it worked well for us. We have to improve on transition and the pass when regaining possession of the ball.
“I think a lot of the players tonight have shown me that they can be trusted in big games, in contrast however, the lads who played in the game at Stoke, also did a pretty good job. We left 5 of them behind, which was mainly due to the travelling back. We’re probably going to get back home at around 3 or 4 in the morning, so we’ll have to assess everybody on Thursday when they come in for training and make sure they’re ready for Saturday against Nottingham Forest.”
