After Rovers were held to a 2-2 draw by Huddersfield Town at Ewood Park, live on Sky Sports, in the first game back after the second international break of the season, Blues boss Tony Mowbray reflected on a game that Rovers should have got all three points from, with the club’s media team.
“It’s a huge frustration for us today, not to have come away from that game with all three points. I think we should have gone into the break with more than the 2-1 scoreline, in my opinion. We lost an early goal that could have easily set us back and put the team in disarray and yet I thought it spurred the team on to play some really nice football in the first-half, we got in some really nice positions, scored some good goals and we could have scored more. (Lewis) Holtby had a great chance which nine times out of ten he scores, yet he slipped it past the post, we had other opportunities with one coming from (Bradley) Dack where he’s sliding in at the back-post and if he gets any sort of touch, it’s in, yet he missed the ball.
“It wasn’t to be in the end and yet you have to give Huddersfield Town credit because they pushed on in the second-half and were more positive and asked questions of us, and yet as we prepared for this game over the international break we knew their forward players were fast and athletic and were fresh out of the Premier League, so it was always going to be a dangerous game for us, particularly as we were without (Darragh) Lenihan, (Greg) Cunningham and (Amari’i) Bell, who got injured in training yesterday. We were a bit light today, having to play (Elliott) Bennett out as a left-back because Joe Grayson and Sam Hart are also both injured, so that’s all our left-footed defenders, bar (Derrick) Williams injured.
“In defence of the team, I could say we were really stretched defensively today and ultimately we lost two goals because of it, but there were some real positives with the ball because we played forward and we pushed them back in order to create chances that would win us the game, yet ultimately we’ve fallen short again which is frustrating, but we have to keep working and believing as we head into the away trip to Birmingham City on Tuesday night.
“I had no fear that we were going to play well today. We’ve had two weeks of preparation for this game even if we had no Derrick Williams and no Corry Evans. I couldn’t leave Derrick out today having been away because we didn’t have any other defenders, but I could leave Corry out because he played in two of Northern Ireland’s international games, but my point is, is that you can’t do anything with them until they get back on the Thursday of the second week, which gives you two days to build your team and prepare for Saturday’s game. I thought the work that we’d done over the break was good and evident in the first-half, the interchanging of the forward players was good and as was some of the build-up. It’s just frustrating to stand here, having lost two goals. Whether they deserved to score two goals is another question, yet I thought they showed their pace and power in the second-half and threated our goal a lot more than they did in the first-half, which caused us to hang on for dear life, although by that time, I thought we should have had the game wrapped up comfortably and should have been looking to score more goals.
“My belief is that, if you control matches, you have a better chance of winning more games. If you keep putting the ball at risk with more direct, long balls, you’re basically giving the ball away 50% of the time. I want us to control games more and feel as if we can play in the opposition’s half and create more chances. It’s not something that I can do with a flick of a switch, this takes time. We have to infiltrate Holtby into the squad gradually, Dack has a slightly different job, as he’s not there to purely win knockdowns from Danny Graham, he has to come in and play with the ball at his feet, (Stewart) Downing has to know when he needs to be inside and when he needs to stand on the touchline, (Adam) Armstrong needs to know when to go to the ball and when to burst in behind with the speed that he’s got. It takes time to build it all up in training and create the patterns so that they have a greater understanding and recognition of how we’re going to play and what we’re going to do. It’s the way I believe you get consistency, if you retain the ball and have clever players in the final third, you can create chances and score goals. I thought the work-rate was there today, as it always has been, but it’s just a different way of playing the game. I think, in my view, the longer term success of the club will rest on if we can get enough good players who can dominate for longer, because the teams who win leagues are the best teams who win and dominate games both home and away, pick the right pass most of the time, and we’ve been trying to bring in better footballers in order to do that.
“My belief is that being direct into, probably, the best target man in the league, in Danny Graham has been good enough to take us this far, and yet Danny, in my opinion should be a ‘Plan B’ at the moment, because I’m developing the other style. I’m not saying anything on air that I haven’t already told the team in private, but we want to be better with the ball in order to control games more, but it is a work in progress at the moment, we have to keep building and believing because somewhere down the line, the fans will expect us to dominate every game and create chances around the box with the likes of Holtby, Dack, Downing and Armstrong. We have to be a bit more patient, but we scored some good goals today and had chances to score a few more, but we have to wait and see as time goes on. We’re frustrated with the result today, but we’ve got more opportunities coming up, so we have to keep going and keep trying to develop the team.
“Holtby has a wonderful personality, he’s always bouncy and happy and has integrated amazingly well into the group because he’s a giving person. He works really hard and has lovely technique with the ball, he wants to listen and continue to learn. We’re delighted he’s here and he can score the odd goal for us, coming in off the right and I think he’ll create goals as well as score them, but he does have to get used to the English tempo. We took him off late on because we can’t expect him to play the full 90 minutes after coming in from Hamburg in the second division in Germany, where they’ve generally dominated the ball and he hasn’t had to do much running, I don’t think, as he’s doing here. He’ll grow into the team, I’m sure. We need to enjoy his talent, he creates and scores goals, yet I’ve just got to get the right balance of players. Holtby, Dack, Downing, Armstrong, (Joe) Rothwell, (Sam) Gallagher, they’re all extremely talented players, but we have to keep going and find a balance in order to utilise their talents to our advantage. We need to try and be a team that opponents fear when they face Blackburn Rovers.
“Are the injuries to the defenders causing me a headache? Well, as a manager you want as many players available as possible in order to give you a good selection headache, yet at this moment, it’s a bad headache as we’re down to the bare bones. In terms of how Bell’s doing? We need to wait and see what the scans say and we’re hopeful that it’s not too bad. I don’t know if he’s going to be available for Tuesday at Birmingham City or Saturday at Preston North End, it’s ‘touch and go’ at the moment, yet we have players like Ryan Nyambe, who’s come into the side and did alright today in spells, particularly in the first-half in attacking areas. We can trust Ryan to do a good job for us. He’s been here ever since the day I arrived and is a player I like. He’s a guy who’s always trying to improve himself and get better on the training ground. We switched Bennett over to the left today because we didn’t have many other options, so we’ll see what happens between now and the games. Injuries are part and parcel of the game, you have to deal with them when they arise, that’s why you have a squad and you don’t like, as a manager, to make excuses with injuries.”
