Bootle blemish on home record
DANNY Whitaker admitted to being ‘bitterly disappointed’ as Macclesfield lost their unbeaten home record on Saturday – but insisted the Silkmen were never going to go unbeaten all through the season.
Macc still sit atop the Northern Premier League West Division, two points ahead of closest rivals Mossley with a game in hand.
But with the disappointment of an early exit from the FA Cup coming just a few weeks ago and Director of Football Robbie Savage saying in his programme notes ahead of the midweek win against Kidsgrove that “We simply cannot lose two or three games in a row at Macclesfield FC – especially if we are not playing well,” Saturday’s defeat only added to the pressure on Whitaker.
Joe Bunney had fired Macc ahead but a secondhalf brace from Ben Hodkinson, including a stoppage time winner, left the home supporters flat.
“Football being football, you are going to lose games of football,” said Whitaker. “There’s no way you can go unbeaten through the whole season. But there is a way to lose and this wasn’t how you should lose, really.
“There’s no excuses, every player needs to go home and think about what they could have done better. Even me – I’ll hold my hands up, I probably made the subs at the wrong time. The game needed a little spark and we thought that would give us that, but ultimately we’ve done that and within a couple of minutes they’ve equalised. I’ll hold my hand up and take responsibility for that, but sometimes you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t because if we’d waited to make changes and something had happened you’d be kicking yourself off the back of that for not making the changes.”
Whitaker did concede that it was a day to forget.
“We’ve had better days, of course we have,” he admitted. “Obviously you don’t want to lose games of football, especially in the way that we have – it shouldn’t happen, no excuses.
“How we conceded the goals should never happen in a million years. It was just very naive from all aspects. There was absolutely nothing in the game, we were cruising at 1-0 and under no threat whatsoever then we do what we did defensively and it let them back in the game. There was still nothing in the game, it was very even, we had a couple of very good chances and didn’t take them and then we defended how we defended for their second.
“We always tell the players to have controlled possession, to wait for the right moment to get in behind or down the sides and look to get shots and link up play around the box we just didn’t do it like we normally do. But that said we weren’t under threat at all, there was no real danger to our goal. They had a few set pieces and that was about it.
“We were massively naive from all aspects. We have a structure and a set up for set pieces, corners for we have a specific structure to combat counter attacks or when the ball’s cleared we’re there to pick up the pieces and recycle possession.
“I’m not sure why Brandon (Lee) ended up on the far side, he has to deal with it better, he knows that. If a player is running past you towards our goal, you have to do everything you can to stop him. If you can’t get back in you pull him back, make a foul. So in that regard we were very naive.
“Brandon already being on a yellow card potentially played a part, but you just have to sense danger, whether you are a defender or not. Just clear the ball, make sure the opposition doesn’t get control of the ball and be in their face and be ugly and then regroup. We just didn’t do that well and we didn’t track runners out of the box because they’ve done it from their box. So no excuses there.”
Whitaker made three changes to the team which had rolled over Kidsgrove 5-0 at the Moss Rose just four days earlier, Lewis Fensome coming back in as part of a threeman defence.
“It wasn’t an unfamiliar position for Lewis, he’s played on the right side of a back three so he’s familiar with that position, we weren’t putting a square peg in a round hole,” said Whitaker.
“We know what he brings to the team, he’s a good, solid defender and we just went a little bit more defensive based on what they could bring going forward.
“On Tuesday night we’d been a little bit too open at times, a little too expansive, and we could have conceded a couple of goals. With that in the back of the mind and knowing what they could bring attacking-wise it made more sense to go a little more defensive, be a bit more solid and give ourselves the option to open up a little bit more in the second half if we needed to.”
Bunney’s goal was his third in as many games and Whitaker felt he could have had another.
“Joe Bunney did well to get in there and get his body on the end of the crosses that are coming in, he times his runs very well,” he said. “He should have had two really and we should have come in at half time 2-0 up.
“I’m just bitterly disappointed. From our perspective, we’re creating chances we’ve just got to take them. If we’d gone in
at 2-0 it’s a completely different game. I think it’s done and dusted then because they were not going to come out and score twice if they were 2-0 down because they’s have opened up anyway and release more space for our attacking players. I’m just really, really disappointed we couldn’t get that second goal which we should have done, but we can’t alter that now.
“We were a little bit slow in possession, moving the ball. We spoke about it at half time and reiterated it strongly – just take two touches and move the ball quickly even if there’s no forward pass on, move it side to side and get them moving over bigger distances and we could
potentially get down the sides and isolate their fullbacks, get some balls into the box or just have sustained pressure in the final third.”
Whitaker threw on Tre Pemberton and Tom Clare around the hour mark to try to wrestle control of the game back.
“We wanted to add that different dimension and spark. We know what Tre brings, he brings energy and gets up and down and we wanted that impetus to spark us into life because we were a little bit flat. Tom came on as the focal point, Nicky wasn’t getting many balls into feet or down the sides so we just tried to change the flow of the game.
“I don’t think we reacted how we should have done straight away (after Kidsgrove equalised). We weren’t under pressure, it wasn’t like we were under siege and they were peppering our goal with attempts – it was the complete opposite.
“We were in control and there was no danger whatsoever. Their goalkeeper made a couple of good saves and we got into some good positions, it was just that final delivery at times, rushing it or not working that extra pass to make the opposition defend – the more they have to defend the more chance you have of scoring a goal.
“We didn’t do that with sufficient quality.”