After two penalties were given in Rovers’ Boxing Day draw with Birmingham City – one for the home side and one against them – which saw the game conclude at 1-1, Blues boss Tony Mowbray reflected on his side’s first game without Bradley Dack, as football at Ewood Park ended for the calendar year of 2019.
“It feels as if another couple of points have got away from us again, unfortunately. I’d have to say, it was a poor game, because I don’t want to disguise it. Birmingham City came here and set up pretty negatively in comparison to how they’ve been in recent weeks, which was probably due to the fact they lost 3-0 in their last away game which was at Hull City. They probably thought that they had to make themselves more solid, which I think they did by putting the experienced heads of (Gary) Gardner and (David) Davis in the centre of their midfield to protect their back four, whilst also hoping to play off (Lukas) Jutkiewicz in order to get up the field. I think, once we got 1-0 up, due to the lack of opportunities within such a dour game, I thought we had a good chance at snatching the game at 1-0. Unfortunately, they went up the other end almost immediately and we gave them a really soft penalty. I asked Amari’i (Bell) and he said he didn’t make contact with their lad (Jacques Maghoma), and yet he seemed to go over as if he’d been hit by a truck. That’s football, unfortunately. I can’t change the decision, so we have to live with it and move on. I was disappointed that we gave them a way back into the game because I couldn’t see them scoring at all and although I knew it would be difficult for us to score, we should have taken the points after getting ourselves ahead.”
“It wasn’t a game full of chances and yet that’s what they aimed to create with how they set up. They came and set up solidly in comparison to how they are at home, where they get their full-backs high up the pitch whilst playing a sitter in a midfield two, to allow his partner to roam up and down. Today, they came with two solid, experienced midfielders in to screen their backline and ultimately they made it difficult for us to break through. Ultimately, in the last 20 minutes, we put Danny (Graham) on and tried to go over the top of their block, because we were having issues playing through. It just didn’t happen for us today. We ended up hitting the bar in stoppage time, through Derrick (Williams) but I’m struggling to remember some clear-cut chances alongside Williams’ header, bar (John) Buckley’s snapshot in the first-half. Generally, it was really hard to create opportunities today and we have to accept the draw and move on. Obviously, we’re not happy because we’ve missed two great opportunities this week by only getting two draws but looking at things in the context of the last eight games, we’re still unbeaten, so we have to keep going and see where we are in a few days after the upcoming hectic block of games leading into the new year.
“I think, most managers who sit in my office after the game say that they come to Ewood Park, knowing that they have to be at their best to get anything, so some teams come with a defensive mindset, whilst others who are footballing teams by nature, know they have to play well to leave here with something. It’s a positive for the team that people understand that they have to work really hard to get anything from here, but we have to keep improving as a team, we have to be better with the ball and make better decisions. I know sometimes that we have to go direct into Danny (Graham) or Sam (Gallagher), and I don’t mind that, because there will be other times where we have to move the ball around with our full-backs serving the midfield. Obviously (Bradley) Dack’s unavailable now, but we’ll hopefully find the creativity and goals from elsewhere.
“Bradley’s had a diagnosis after numerous scans and it’s what we feared, really. It’s an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) and he’ll have that repaired within the next two weeks. He needs to let it settle down a bit and let the swelling and the fluid go before starting on his rehabilitation. He won’t play again this season or a few months into next season either, so we probably won’t see Bradley out on the field for us until this time next year, most probably. It’s a cruel blow for Brad as an individual, but also for the club as well. Our thoughts are with him, but after his operation, the hard work starts for him in order to get himself and his knee back into the shape it was, and I’m sure he’ll come back stronger than he is now.
“Others do now have to fill in with Bradley’s absence, but we have to wait and see what January brings as well. We do have the likes of (Joe) Rothwell, (Lewis) Holtby, (John) Buckley, (Dominic) Samuel, (Ben) Brereton and (Dan) Butterworth, who’s actually injured at the moment, all of whom can fill in behind the striker, along with more young lads in the under-23s. We’ve got lots of attacking options, but we have to see if someone steps up to the mark, or whether we feel that we need to go and strengthen in that area in January to try and maintain what we’re doing. We’ll wait and see and make those decisions as the time rolls on.
“Although we don’t have a perfect like-for-like replacement for Bradley, we have Holtby who can play there, Buckley played there for the under-23s recently and got two goals away at Newcastle United. Whether Rothwell can play there is something we’ll test at some stage, along with Brereton, but we’ll have to wait and see. I don’t think it’s a case of simply switching formation to accommodate the loss of Bradley, I think we’ve got options to fill his spot. It’s really difficult during this spell to see how they’d all operate in that role in training, because we’re not really getting any consistent training time due to the hectic nature of the fixture list where we’re playing five games within a fortnight or so, so there’s little time to work on the pattern of play or for the tactics for a specific game, because you are recovering or tactically preparing for the next one which is at times, less than 72 hours after a game.
“In terms of our improving away form, I think that’s down to the fact we’ve got our main defenders back, if I’m honest, and yet we’ve lost Ryan (Nyambe) today on top of Tosin (Adarabioyo) being unavailable for the last two. I think having a settled back four helps, but we have to wait and see what happens between now and the next game. Away from home, we’ve picked up a few results, yet the key is to find the consistency on the road. The points we have got so far, have been against sides, who in my mind, bar Bristol City, we should be beating. The likes of Hull City, Reading and Stoke City were all struggling when we played them on those given days. This league is very competitive as we know, yet away games are even harder than home games because it’s difficult to get the balance and setup of play right because, if you’re too positive and you lose, you get criticised for not being defensive enough and yet if you go too defensive, people will tell you you’re being negative and aren’t playing enough attackers. It’s a fine balance that we’ve improved upon during the last few weeks, so let’s see, as the injuries come along, how the team changes in each game. An example of that was today, where the team changed due to the ages we have in the squad as well as the injuries to Bradley and Corry (Evans). When you see the likes of Danny (Graham) and Stewart (Downing) at 34 and 35 respectively, and they’re a bit under the weather after playing two days before, it forces you to utilise your squad and this period is going to see the squad utilised more than any other period.
“I’m not too sure at the moment how the likes of Ryan, Tosin and Corry are, in terms of whether they’ll be available on Sunday away at Huddersfield Town. I’m not sure what Ryan’s done, but what I do know is that, if he can play, he will. Corry picked up a knock against Wigan Athletic. How quickly is he going to recover? I’m not sure, but I think he’ll be ready soon. Tosin, I’m hoping fits into the same category, he’s been out on the grass with the physio department, which suggests to me that he’s not far away from re-joining the squad. When I get the green light from the physio department, I’ll consider them for selection, but for the moment we have to keep going.”
