Still hope Town’s defence learn from their mistakes

Town boss John Still couldn’t hide his frustration with Town’s defending during their 3-2 victory over Lincoln City on Saturday, writes Mike Simmonds.
Town boss John StillTown boss John Still
Town boss John Still

Hatters’ backline had kept six clean sheets in nine matches prior to the game, looking far more solid than they had in recent campaigns.

Twice though they conceded from long throws by the Imps, despite it being something Still had specifically warned them about beforehand.

He said: “I was disappointed with the goals, I said their biggest strength was their long throws and we worked on them on Friday non stop.

“For the first one, one person didn’t do his job, I’m not going to name him, he knows who he is and he’s apologised, and the same for the second one.

“The person was not in the right position and we worked on it, so that was disappointing.

“We actually went through it and said this is their biggest danger.

“I’m not saying I couldn’t see them scoring from any other way, but that was a way that if they were going to score was going to be a big danger.

“If I hadn’t have mentioned it, I would put my hands up myself, like the other day when I thought I picked the wrong team.

“I could have said, hold on I didn’t tell you about that, or it wasn’t evident in the reports that we’ve had.

“But I read the reports, we went through it on Friday, this is your job, this is your job, this is your job, so that’s disappointing.”

Lincoln’s aerial dominance caused Town a massive problem in the opening 25 minute as the visitors were in almost total control.

An attack shorn of Paul Benson struggled badly, before once Still made some alterations, Hatters got a foothold in the game.

He said: “I think we missed out on a focal point of our attack, to hold the ball higher up the pitch.

“They’re a big strong side and Cully did absolutely fantastic, but that’s not his best job.

“So we just felt that maybe we had to try and get the ball a bit shorter to people and I think we did that, particularly second half and once we did, we got going.

“With someone like Benno and even Jon Shaw and even Alex Wall, they’re a different type of player, but I said we’ve got to cross early.

“If a defender’s got you, by crossing early, it gives you a bit of space, that was a perfect cross and a perfect goal (Mark Cullen’s equaliser).

“That got us on it, when we scored that I honestly believed we’d win the game, so I was really disappointed with the other one went in,

“But maybe in the end end, it’s just a learning curve for one or two about how important it is to know what your job is.”

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