Archived News from April 2003
|
CURLE AND HORTON REACTION
|
 |
|
-----------
Audio interview with Keith Curle from Radio Nottingham (RealPlayer needed) http://www.bbc.co.uk/nottingham/realmedia/football/2003/mansfield_port_vale_home_curle.ram ----------- http://www.port-vale.premiumtv.co.uk Post Match Comments From The Manager Brian Horton knows chances were missed to sew up the points early on, but it quite content with returning with a win. He said: “It was tight, it was nervous early on, but some of the chances we have created today with some good play was unbelievable for an away side. I haven't said anything to them because players don't mean to miss chances. “One of the lads said, 'We've had loads of chances' and I said 'It doesn't matter, we've won the game', it doesn't matter because it's three points tomorrow, but I would have liked it to have been two or three then we could ease of a little bit, that's us not the players, but they should have been dead and buried really. “But credit to Mansfield, they kept battling and fighting and throwing some people at us up front. It's never an easy place to come, but the pitch was magnificent. I thought we started nervously, grew with confidence and in fact it was probably the hardest chance we've had that we scored off. “Durns is claiming it, which is quite right, though it took a bit of a deflection, but it was probably the hardest one of the lot. Steve McPhee missed a chance, but he does so much good work for the team, the players respect what he does for the team. He works his socks off, he wins headers, he chases back and that's the hard part for him at the moment, just putting it in the net. “I thought when he scored against Chesterfield it would open up the floodgates for him, but I'm not being critical of him because he keeps getting in there and that's the hard thing sometimes is not to go in, but he's gone again and he's caused them problems with his pace. “He's made the two chances for himself today with his pace, so I've got nothing to say to them today apart from well done, because we've got three points and now it's next week. There's a bit of flu in the place so we are going to have to be careful, but they have set themselves up now. “There was a magnificent crowd today, they have come and roared us on. They have had to put there heads in and battled. Bridgey has done what Boydy has done now. He's won a great block tackle and he's done exactly the same. I'm not sure whether he will be out for that long but he has certainly tweaked his medial ligament. “But it was a great tackle and that's what you have to do. Unfortunately we may have to lose him for next week, but Armers comes on and the crowd love him don't they? He should have gone on and scored, Adie should have gone on and scored, Brooks was unlucky because he's rifled one straight at Pilks, but three points is a major thing today, no matter if it is six, or five, or one-nothing, you still only get three points for it. “Bridgey has hit the woodwork twice today. I had a little word with him yesterday about just calming down, because he's a good player and he's been rushing things. I told him to have a touch because they can't kick you now and that was two bits of quality from him, “I thought he was much, much better today. He passed it and it was a great ball through for the goal through Brisco making a run through the middle. There were three midfield layers involved in that move. “It was a hard decision to leave Ian Brightwell out today, but Clarkey is a good defender and I thought he handled Wayne Corden really well and Wayne is a handful. He was decent at Port Vale and he's come here and opened a new niche for himself and he's dangerous and Clarkey has done a fantastic job on him today, which you have to do when you play that system. “It's another clean sheet. dean Delaney has gone down with flu, I got a phone call yesterday that he couldn't get out of bed and so he couldn't play, so that was the reason Goody came in and we had young Joe Molloy on the bench today, we had to because there's no other 'keeper. “There will still be some twists and turns and they were all winning at half time. I told them, I didn't hide it from them and I told them, you'd better get your fingers out because they are all winning. There will be some twists and turns yet, but by doing what we have done today, having clean sheets, that will look after itself.” |
Latest | April 2003