Managers Post Alloa Athletic

Link to audio of both managers’ post match interviews

“We went ahead in the game with a well taken goal on the counterattack” started Stevie Crawford. Gabby McGill played a good ball to Kyle (Turner) who has got the vision to send a great ball across to Greg Kiltie and he finished it well.

“We looked a little bit edgy when we were on the ball and a little bit nervous which happens at times after a few defeats. We lost a poor goal towards the end of the first half to allow Alloa back into the game and that makes it difficult for us.

“Alloa area tram that will try to play football. We knew that and the one thing where we weren’t good enough today was out of possession. We didn’t press the ball aggressively enough and that is something that we will look back at.”

There were periods of possession particularly in the second half that just did not come to anything.

“Yes we did. On that side of it, towards the end of the game I will give credit to the boys we kept going. We got a bit of balance with Josh Edwards coming on at left back and putting Lewis Martin in middle. We had a natural left footer on the left hand side but I am not singling out any one individual the actual quality of the ball into the box let us down. We didn’t create enough chances to go on and get ourselves back into it.

Was there a lack of intensity going forward throughout the ninety minutes?

“As I say, out of possession we did not get after them enough. That brings intensity to it. Sometimes there is a time to try and put your foot on the ball, try and get control of the game. We had worked on trying to switch play and get at Alloa by getting the ball from one side to the other.

“A few defeats and you start looking sideways and back the way instead of looking forward. It is something that we will work on next week and we will have to get the boys to be braver in possession of the ball. Sometimes that means being brave trying to look forward to play it forward but if you give the ball away then we will accept that all day long.

“Not that we want to encourage boys to give the ball away but if we are going to try and create real goalscoring opportunities it is having the bravery to take the ball and try to break teams down.”

Your team selection saw five changes from the side that lost at Arbroath last Saturday, would you stick by your decision to bring in players to give them game time?

“I said at the start of the week that we came into the game knowing that it was a competitive fixture. I just felt on the back of a few performances there were boys deserving of a chance. It can be difficult at times to be thrown in, some of the boys have only had a couple of games or one game but that is no excuse. The massive thing for me was that collectively we weren’t good enough and a big part of that was out of possession we never got after them enough.”

Asked about Ryan Dow’s absence SC replied:-

“Ryan has been unfortunate, we have missed him with a knee injury that he has picked up. He was running on Friday, we will have to see where we are with him in the early part of the week to see if he can possibly be in contention for starting next week.”

How is Tom Lang?

“I have not had a chance to see Kevin (Bain) yet. He will be disappointed. I think it was his hamstring that he was feeling, I am not sure to what extent.”

The manager ended stressing:-

“Today, out of possession against a side that tried to play football we weren’t aggressive enough in trying to stop them playing football and we got punished for it.”

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