United boss Greg Abbott (GA) spoke to BBC Radio Cumbria's James Phillips (JP) following Carlisle's 4-0 League One defeat away to Bradford City, Abbott saying that football is a tough industry:
JP
I don’t even know how to start with you today, I think I will give it to you, what do you want to say after that game, what is in your head and your heart tonight?
GA
There are loads of things going on in my head, my heart, it doesn’t really matter about what that thinks. It is tough isn’t it, the industry is tough. The game is all about competing on a level playing field and you set a team out and you tell them and explain to them what the strengths are of the Bradford side. It is not a difficult thing to see when you see them play and the way that they play off big James Hanson and the way they compete and get the ball from back to front quickly and make life difficult for the second balls.
We talked about stopping the delivery into the front men initially and we talked about second balls and we talked about closing people down and getting in people’s faces and making life difficult. I think we have been from top to bottom, maybe the goalkeeper [Mark Gillespie], it is harsh to judge the Bradford goalkeeper [Jon McLaughlin] because he didn’t have much to do, but Mark was our best player by a considerable mile.
But, across the rest of it man for man they were tougher, more experienced, had more nous about the game and in the end made us look a really ragged side. You can’t be too much more honest than that. But, again, it is not about making excuses but we were too young and fragile, we had too many young players, we need everybody we have got, we need the warriors. You look at people like Gary Jones, Andrew Davies, Nathan Doyle, Mark Yeates, the way Hanson is developing, Rory McArdle, James Meredith, they are all men.
We have got too many lads learning the trade and you get found out, you do get found out, and League One is not a nice place to try to do it. It is a tough league, it is where I spent a lot of my career, League One and the Championship, or they called it Division Three and Two. So, it is easy for me to tell them what is going to come. There were too many, certainly of our senior players, or the senior of the senior players that we have got, you are talking about James Berrett and Liam Noble who have let us and themselves down today, and we have all let the club down today.
Because, it isn’t good enough from top to bottom, I have said that first, I have got to say that I have let myself down, because without that I can’t go to the players. I can’t just bundle criticism on them without taking my share, I have put the team together, I have assembled the squad, but it is difficult when they are signing Mark Yeates on thousands and we are signing people on hundreds.
That makes a big difference and people can look at it how they want and you can even look at the Premier League and I know who is going to win the league and who is not going to win the league, and it is the same in this league. Success comes with a bit of a price I am afraid and good teams come with a bit of a price I am afraid. When you are not paying the price then sometimes you get found out and we got found out today.
But, it is not the be-all and end-all, it is not the over-riding factor and it is not a blame that or that or that situation. They were tougher and better in a lot of departments, most departments today, and then it makes it very difficult whatever system I want to play to do anything about it, because all over the field we were very much, very ,very much second. I will start if you want with the dugouts because I don’t want to deflect from, and I would never deflect from any responsibility, absolutely not, so there you are, top to bottom.
JP
But, you have to start to talk about money and the fact that they could bring in Yeates, and that wasn’t a factor on Wednesday night when you won through against Blackburn, why was it a factor today?
GA
This was always going to be more difficult than Blackburn because Blackburn don’t really want to be playing at Carlisle and they are saving themselves for the Championship. Those things happen, there were five shocks and they are not really shocks anymore because League One and League Two, nobody really takes much notice of it.
So, they didn’t play with the intensity that they would have done if it had been a life or death game. Bradford played with an intensity today as if it was life or death, and we said before the game that this would be miles, miles more difficult than the Blackburn game.
JP
How do you try to turn this around then because it is two games, it is nine goals conceded, you are minus eight already?
GA
We just have to go back to work on Monday, I can’t give you a magic formula because if I did I would have done it today. But, what we do need, is we need Sean O’Hanlon and we need Lee Miller and we need Matty Robson and we need all those people back and fit and commanding our back four and keeping clean sheets. Defensively, they were pretty easy to breach I thought today, easier than they should be anyway, so I am always going to be under a bit of pressure of what to do when we concede goals.
I mean to be fair the first one is a wonder goal, you won’t see a better one. The second one, we have still got to won second balls in the middle of the pitch, we lose too many battles in the middle of the pitch, the ball ends up in our last third and that is a danger area for us. Hanson and Nahki Wells really have given the two or three centre-halves a tough afternoon today, really tough.
JP
Gary Jones in their midfield, 36, in his 37th year, just trying to hang onto his football career, he has shown some lads what heart and desire mean out there hasn’t he?
GA
Gary Jones is a really good player, he is one that we tried to get a couple of years ago but we couldn’t afford him. You can see that he is worth his money because he is an experienced professional who knows the game, and he is a very fit lad who has looked after himself very well. But, he is a tough, tough competitive player and that is a learning curve for Liam Noble and James Berrett if they have got aspirations of getting any further forward in their careers, that they have got to compete against the likes of Jones and Doyle, and today they were very much second best as well.
JP
Should that not have been the case, as good as the talent that they are, should they not have been able to be dominated as they were by Jones and Doyle out there?
GA
I don’t know, but they were, and it makes life difficult for the team, because they were dominated, my two centre-halves were dominated and my two centre-forwards were dominated. So, forget about what is on the outsides of the pitch, it matters what goes down the spine of the pitch, and two, two and two they were miles and miles ahead of us today, and that is going to make life very hard to get a result out of it.
JP
What do you do now, how do you get an improvement on that, I mean clearly you got it for Blackburn after Leyton Orient but this is in the league and it must be a really hard blow for you?
GA
Yeah, it is not easy, the game is not easy, anybody thinks that I can just turn up on Monday and switch on a switch and we will be better and it will be easy then they can forget about it. Next week will be the toughest game probably of the whole of my tenure because it is imperative that we get a result. But, you need support and you need the players prepared to die, when I played I prepared to die, I didn’t have as much ability as Noble or Berrett or any of them, but I was prepared to die.
If somebody got the better of me then they got the better of me with bumps and bruises. There were not too many bumps and bruises on the Bradford team today, we have got plenty and we have got a lot of broken hearts in the dressing room. But, we can’t feel too sorry for ourselves because we didn’t really deserve much more than a defeat.
JP
We have said that before though, why isn’t a Greg Abbott team giving that heart and desire, why isn’t that translating, because I know it won’t have come from you to not give that heart and desire?
GA
We are going over old ground, we have gone through it all, we have gone through all that, I have gone through the reasons. I think that they were tougher, stronger, more experienced, and with the finance that they have had to put that squad together, way, way, way ahead of us. We have got to bridge the gap somehow and we have got to bridge it through effort and determination. They were too strong for us today, they simply were, and I can’t give you any more answers than I have already given you. I can’t because I have given you them.
JP
Your senior players that you were so clearly missing today, are any of them hopes for being back in a week’s time?
GA
Well, Lee won’t be will he, Matty Robson probably won’t be, the only one we have got a hope for Sean O’Hanlon, but I think if ever we needed Sean in the best of form, but again, Sean has missing for probably three or four weeks, it is whether we can get him fit enough to be able to go and start a game. But, we certainly need his power and his nous and his experience and his determination, because we looked very fragile there today.
JP
Almost 800 Carlisle fans came to this today, some of them clearly very unhappy at the end, what do Carlisle need to do now for them as much as anyone today?
GA
We have to do what we have done in these circumstances before, nobody wants them to travel and see a performance like that, I don’t want to travel to a game and see a performance like that. I sympathise with them, I take on board all the moans and groans. The game is not a nice game at the moment, it was nice on Wednesday, it wasn’t very nice last week, we need to regroup and get everybody back fit.
JP
This is a different scenario and the fans need to appreciate that?
GA
Well, you do look at the age group of the team that started the game, it is always going to be difficult. It is going to be the toughest season I have had by miles, right, by miles, because of the thinness of the squad. But, we need no injuries and we need senior players playing to start with to get us off to a bit of a start. It will be even tougher now than it was two weeks ago because we have lost two games too heavily. That is tough, but they are things we have to deal with, we have to find a way of dealing with them, we can’t bleat on, we have to find a way of dealing with them?
JP
My opinion as a fan, managers need much longer, but I have to ask, there were fans chanting ‘Abbott Out’ in amongst that group today, what would you say to them, how would you try to appease them and tell them that this is going to come good and come good soon?
GA
You actually doubt yourselves sometimes, you actually doubt yourself on are you doing the right things, are you saying and giving the right messages out. This is the industry you are in, when you don’t win fans have reactions and their reaction today, I think they are entitled to ask the question of do you we know what we are doing, have we got enough answers.
I don’t think I have done too much wrong, what we have got a team that isn’t as good as it should be at the minute with the injury problems we have got and the people unavailable. But, I am certainly not going to argue with an opinion off the fans today, I haven’t got much grounds to argue with to be honest with you.