After Rovers failed to do the double over relegation-tipped Wycombe Wanderers, after the Chairboys beat the Blues by a 1-0 scoreline in an uninspiring Good Friday encounter, Blackburn boss Tony Mowbray highlighted where his side went wrong during their trip to Adams Park.
“Today’s game was one that we’ve seen a couple times this season. We huffed and puffed, but ultimately, we lacked the quality within the final third that would have made the difference. We fell short today. You know that every game in this league is tough, and before the international break, we managed to get a credible draw against the team who are running away with the league in Norwich City, yet today we’ve come to the team bottom of the league and lost 1-0. What’s the difference between both opponents and our performance? We had a lot more of the ball today and couldn’t do enough with it to score, before losing the game via one of their strengths, which is set pieces. I don’t have anything else to say other than, we’re left frustrated and disappointed because we’ve lacked the quality needed in the final third, today. This kind of situation has happened a lot this season, but what else can you do, other than keep working on it? These are the players and the team we’ve got, and I believe that they’re capable of competing against everybody in this league and yet, as this league is showing, the teams at the bottom can always do well. A good example is of when I first arrived at this club and we were at the bottom. We only lost three of the 15 games we had left, and we showed how difficult it was to play against a team at the bottom who were fighting for their lives.
“I think Wycombe deserve some credit for the way they dug in and fought for every ball, cleared their lines and how they put us under pressure with their directness, which is a real strength of theirs. We, of course, need to be able to defend that and at one moment in the game, we didn’t which is what led to their goal. That’s the ultimate frustration and I can’t really defend it, whether it be a lack in concentration or whatever. Tomorrow, the players will watch it back and we’ll review it as a team, and we’ll see who’s culpable. Was it one of the blockers or the two central defenders inside the six-yard box? Why was their scorer (Fred Onyedinma) allowed a free header inside the box? All of these questions will be answered when we break it down tomorrow. I think over the last month, we’ve been quite good at defending set-pieces. We changed from a more man-marking system to a more zonal structure and the goals-against column for set-pieces had dried up, which is good, but today, that has cost us the game.
“Undoubtedly, Adam Armstrong’s presence in the side helps our team, but I don’t think his absence is relevant to today’s lack of goals. He trained yesterday and we took a collective decision as staff that it was too early to risk him today. We tried that against Bristol City recently, and it set him back a few weeks. We didn’t want to throw him in for the sake of it, because, if things aren’t quite right, it could cause him to miss even more games, so we tried to give him the extra rest. Adam can score from nothing, really. He doesn’t need to be on the end of a brilliant passing move or build-up in order to score, but he wasn’t available today and we went with what we had. We hope that Adam will be back for Monday’s game against Bournemouth, but we need to make sure he’s feeling 100% before we throw him back in, because as I’ve said, we don’t want to risk him.
“Ultimately, Wycombe surprised us with their shape, because I don’t think they’ve played with a three-at-the-back this season, or at least never started in it, and it’s quite strange as to why they decided to do that. The positioning of our strikers, as a result, wasn’t good and we change that at the break, but it didn’t alter too much. In my opinion, formations don’t make too much of a difference, because the playstyle is what takes precedent, whether you want to focus on ball retention or directness, and how you want your players to be when you’re on the ball, in terms of breaking into the box, that’s the most important part of setting up a team, in my opinion. Today’s lack of prowess was due to a combination of poor quality on the ball and hesitancy regarding how many men we wanted in their area. That showed in the final minutes, as when we started to pile men forwards, they brought everyone back which made it harder for us to manoeuvre in their box. It would have been nice if one of the half-chances we had from Bradley Johnson or Tom Trybull, had gone in, but it wasn’t to be today.
“At the end of the day, football is about being ruthless in both boxes. It’s an old adage in football that managers can roll out, but ultimately, if you’re not ruthless in both boxes, you can lose matches as we’ve done today. We need to be more clinical when attacking and ruthless when the half-chances come along, and we have to force them into their net. At the other end, you have to put your body on the line more and fight for the points. I’m not saying that’s the exact reason why we lost today, but overall, over the course of all the tight games you get in a season, ruthlessness in both boxes might be the fine detail and the difference between us winning and dropping points, that we’ve been missing.
“Although I know Jonathan Woodgate very well, the challenge we’ll face against Bournemouth will be more regarding their players, than Woody. Their players have been Premier League footballers and they have high quality all over the park. They’re a pretty expensively assemble group of footballers and that there in itself is our challenge. It’s one that we can rise to and one I believe we can overcome, but although we need to bounce back from today’s disappointment, we also need to look forward to the challenge of playing Bournemouth at Ewood Park.”
