|
" It’s a big blow obviously. Everybody is absolutely gutted with that but I think the referee got what he wanted, that’s all I need to say about it. I don’t know what offence Karl Hawley was committing when he was allowing their centre-half to climb all over him but he obviously he didn’t see that to be a foul but then he gives a pathetic free-kick on the touchline.
" He’s put three minutes up and I think it was about three and a half minutes gone when the lad strikes the free-kick but after that it’s a really poor goal to give away. I’m really disappointed, we had so many bodies in there defending it and it’s just spun off Kev’s head (Kevin Gray) and gone flying past Keiren (Westwood) which obviously we are all gutted about.
" I have to say though that I thought it was an excellent game of football today on a dreadful surface. It killed us in a few situations where we’ve got in good areas and had good possession around the box . When you’ve got people like Karl Hawley, Michael Bridges and Adam Murray who’ve got good feet, can move the ball, can take it to one side and get shots and create chances for others then this pitch doesn’t help us in any way at all. It didn’t do us any favours today. "
" We did enough to win the game because we were 1-0 up. We had to defend and Keiren has had to make saves though. I think Cheltenham are a very good side, don’t get me wrong, I thought they came, they were organised, they were disciplined and they’ve thrown a lot of people upfront towards the end which they are going to do to go and chase the game and we’ve dealt with everything.
" Kevin Gray and Danny Livesey have dealt with the two strikers, (Steve) Guinan and (Kayode) Odejayi and then even (Damian) Spencer when he came on. We got to grips better with (JJ) Melligan today than we have done in the previous two games and I thought we had some really good opportunities. Their keeper has made a good save from Glenn Murray, he’s made an excellent save from Adam Murray in the first half and we’ve had the chances to win it. I think they’ll probably say that they deserved something out of it but I think they way that they’ve done it we’re really gutted about it.
" The league table is irrelevant at the moment, it would have been nice to have gone top but that is not really that important at this point. It would have been a massive confidence boost though to have gone to the top of the table but we’re going to have to keep working to make sure we do it on another day.
" We’ve got the LDV to concentrate on now on Tuesday night and then we can start concentrating about the Macclesfield game next Sunday, which now we’ve got to go and take it out on them.
" If we’ve got a good surface we know what we can do. Me criticising the pitch is nothing against the groundstaff. It’s just the state that it is in, we’ve tried to do some remedial work on it to get the goalmouths right and we’ve tried to put drainage in in the summer. I think the talk at the moment is that it is going to be totally ripped up in the summer and a lot of money is going to be needed to be spent on it to get it decent. "
" We’ve shown when we’ve been on good football pitches that we can play. We went to Wrexham and passed the ball, we played at Cheltenham which is an excellent pitch and passed the ball, Boston was firm the other night and we were allowed to pass it and keep possession and when we got around the box the skilful players that we’ve got have got something to go and play on. You put people like (Simon) Hackney, Bridges, (Chris) Lumsdon, Adam Murray and Hawley out on a surface like that and it’s not easy to play.
" The LDV is the first game to get this out of our system. We want to do well in that one because we want to get through to the Northern final to start with but I think we really want to get back to it with the Macclesfield game next Sunday. We need to be right for that, obviously I’ll be taking the game on Tuesday very, very seriously because, as I say, we want to get through but at the moment I haven’t even thought about that.
" I am gutted for everyone in there because I think we’ve worked our socks off today to get a result and we’ve had to go and grind it out. To get done with ten seconds of injury time to go is a real sickener.
" In the closing stages you’re looking and you’re asking the players to do the things and we’ve got the ball, we’ve got a throw-in and we’ve tried to throw it down the line. I have to be honest that I couldn’t see whether it was a free-kick but they tell me it wasn’t a free-kick on the touchline and then he’s given that. Some of the decisions he’s made, he’s given free-kicks for minimal contact and then you’ve got players who are getting mauled and getting dragged down and Karl was getting mugged on the edge of the 18-yard box. Whether he was in, I don’t really know whether it’s a penalty or not but it’s a foul in our favour and he doesn’t give it. We’re wanting him to do it so we can kill the game and stop their momentum and, as I say, there have been a few strange ones.
" Obviously we’re delighted to have got a point out of it, we’re still going along nicely and the other teams have drawn up at the top, so we’re still in the same position. It’s when you get done like that though that it’s a sickener, I’m quite sure once everything calms down and I get home and I sit in my chair and relax I will calm down and feel a bit better about it. Just at this moment though it’s maybe too soon after the game but I am very, very disappointed and I know that everybody is in the changing room. I’ll watch all the video, I need to see it how it comes about and that’s the fun for the Simpson family tonight. "