Seasiders hit a new low under McDonald
NEIL McDONALD admits it can’t get any worse for Blackpool after a quickfire double from Shrewsbury’s Jean-Louis Akpa-Akpro piled the pain on the listless Seasiders.
The Salop striker struck twice in three minutes to snare Shrewsbury’s first home points of the season as a downbeat McDonald admitted there were no positives for his beached Blackpool side to take from the game.
Fulham loanee Larnell Cole provided the assists for both second-half goals, as Town’s persistence prevailed.
“I can’t find any positives,” McDonald said. “We forgot how to move, tackle and pass in the second half and we deserved what we got.
“The players are all disappointed and so they should be. It was the worst performance since I came to the football club.
“We’re definitely at rock bottom.We never really got at them and we’ve conceded two poor goals which are hard to stomach.
“It’s hard to remain positive.We came up against a team that hadn’t picked up a point at home and we were outplayed in the second half.”
Tyrone Barnett forced a sixth-minute save from Colin Doyle.
Doyle then got behind Cole’s fierce effort as Shrewsbury pressed again before Town wide man Sullay Kaikai flashed a shot past the post.
Blackpool’s John Herron chested the ball into space inside the Salop penalty area before firing wide two minutes into the second half.
Jordan Clark then saw his 61st-minute shot slide wide at the other end.
Blackpool thought they had taken the lead only for Cullen to see his effort ruled out after bundling home the rebound from Brad Potts’ strike seven minutes later.
James Collins’ header was then cleared off the line as Shrewsbury looked to reassert control. And they succeeded when AkpaAkpro latched onto Cole’s neat pass to slot them in front on 73 minutes.
The pair combined again only three minutes later, with Cole once more finding the AkpaAkpro in space, clipping the ball over Doyle to seal the win.
Shrewsbury boss Micky Mellon said:“It feels great to get our first win at home.We’re obviously disappointed it’s taken so long but we’ve finally got it off our back.
“We got that goal and our whole world changed.
“We kept building and building and hopefully we can move further forward off the back of this.
“I want to go and score goals and we’ve not scored enough of late.
“But Jean-Louis has scored with two cool finishes and we’ve won three from our last four so things aren’t that bad.”