We spoke to Mike Williamson, following our defeat to Walsall.
Mike began with an overview of the game: "Obviously, it's difficult when you start and concede a goal in the way we did.
“I think Walsall deserve a lot of credit. The manager's been there for a couple of years now and what he's built is very, very difficult to play against. They've got some very, very strong and good players that can hurt us and they did that.
“It's not about being too defeatist, but they were stronger certainly tonight and we've got to look at areas where we use that as a marker for ourselves. I thought we let ourselves down a little bit when we lack quality, when we give simple passes away which was disappointing but overall it was a difficult evening because they're where they should be in the league.”
The Blues started poorly in both halves, we asked Mike if that was a concern, he responded: "There's many things that we're facing and I wouldn't say we're concerned, but we've got to improve on many areas of the game.
"We obviously need to be more threatening and I thought we did have willing runners forward, but we couldn't affect their back line when we did get through and in the last 15, 20 minutes we had a bit more control on it but we really struggled to affect their goal.
“But then on the flip side in the transition, how fast and how quickly they broke and the chances that they got, it was evident. There's many things that we're working on and improving and off the back of a positive performance at the weekend, it is disappointing but I think we've got to understand it."
We asked Mike about making games a little bit more ugly. Whether he felt we needed to do be a bit more direct in our approach, he answered: “We obviously wanted to get a point out of this but it's not about making it look ugly, it's about making sure we stick to our principles and we do it right. When we have games where we've controlled it and we move the ball and we've got the detail, we're very, very hard to play against. That doesn't take away our out-of-possession stuff.
“Our in-possession stuff doesn't reflect our out-of-possession stuff. We need to be hard to beat and difficult and I thought we did that Saturday and I thought they just overpowered us tonight.”
Mike spoke about our third goal. A goal that summed up our luck at the moment, as the ball ricocheted across the goal and right to Jamile Matt for a tap in:
“I think that when you're on the front foot and you're as confident as they are, they're obviously going to pick up the ricochets and second balls but it's not luck, it's confidence, it's momentum, it's anticipating things rather than reacting to things and we've got to make sure that we just focus on everything that we can control.
"We've got to get to the position where we're going out into games, we're coming out first half, second half with a feeling that they had of ultimate confidence, that they're just going to be relentless in everything they do and even if something does go against them it's not going to set them back.
“That's not where we're at the minute but we are going to get there.”
The Blues did score late on, through Jon Mellish, but it was too little too late. Mike spoke on that:
“I think for me it just shows the character. I don't see a group of lads that don't want to run for each other or don't want to fight for each other, I just see a group of lads that are giving everything and fighting and keep coming up short. That does knock us and that's understandable but we've got to control the controllables and how we recover and how we dust ourselves down and then we've got to get ready for a big game on Saturday.”
Aaron Hayden returned to the side, but came off at half-time. We asked Mike if that was just a case of managing his minutes, he said:
“It was a case of not overloading him because he hasn't had much training. It's a really positive sign that he's back, he's a great leader and brings quality but we had a few changes planned because of trying to look after the lads.”
The line-up sprung some surprises, with Cameron Harper lining up on the right of defence and Jon Mellish on the left. Mike explained the selections: “We wanted to be hard to beat, we know they carry such a physical threat and a real energy so we had a disciplined, physically strong team in terms of the back five.
"Obviously you can't legislate for giving a goal away in the nature we did but up until half-time we didn't penetrate their back line and we didn't affect their goal and it was transition where they got through us, but in the whole I thought set pieces and when we got behind the ball we defended well.
“We've just got to make sure that we're alive in open play and we're staying with our men and we're covering the ground and we're not switching off.”
Sam Lavelle came off with a nasty injury. Mike gave us an update on him: “He's a warrior like many, but he's broken his nose so I think he's going to have to go to A&E to get that sorted.”
Mike also addressed Charlie Wyke’s absence: “He was just ill, that’s why he wasn’t involved."
Finally, on preparing for Saturday, when we host Cheltenham, Mike said:
“We’ll look to come in tomorrow and debrief and watch it back and speak to them individually or in departments, make sure they get a good recovery and have a good day off and then come in and we're working towards getting another reaction.”
