Alex Neil was positive about our performance against Charlton despite seeing his side drop out of the League One play-off places…
CONFIDENCE
"I've got real confidence in this group. The last two performances have been good. You always want your team to reflect you, that's what you want as a coach, and what I've said to the players is that the last thing I want us to be is a soft touch. We need to stand up, fight our corner, and then equally we need to have a quality to play through teams. I thought we showed all that today.
CHARLTON
"They're a big strong team, they put balls in the box, you have to defend and fight. Let's be honest, if we score today the conversation is about how well we played. It's frustrating that we didn't, but I thought we took care of our performance today. The last five minutes of the first half I thought they had a bit of threat, but up until that point we were dominant, had four or five really good opportunities to score. We started the second half brightly, and then for around 20 minutes it became a bit scrappy.”
AGGRESSIVE SUBS
"We made some really aggressive subs and it became a bit more open. We again have two or three really good opportunities to score, and they had one. We created more chances today than we have in the last two or three matches, which is frustrating. We've given ourselves a platform now by looking solid defensively and keeping clean sheets, and I though the first-half performance in particular was as well as we played since I've got here.”
POOR FINISHING
"We weren't as clinical as we have been, and the goalkeeper has had a good game. If you'd offered me as much play as we had in terms of getting into the final third, I'd have taken it because I'd have thought we'd score at least two goals. The frustrating part is not scoring, but I'm a big believer that if the performances are right, the results will follow.”
CLEAN SHEET
"We haven't been defensively stable this season but the last couple of games we have. The balance of our play at the moment is good, we just haven't got what we deserve."
