Alex Neil has given his thoughts on our fortunate 1-1 draw with Rotherham at the Stadium Of Light. Neil mentioned what he had worked on within the week, touched on the role of the fans and previewed the final game of the season against Morecambe
DISAPPOINTMENT
"The game panned out exactly as I thought it would pan out - they're very physical, they put the ball forward. I think my biggest disappointment was obviously the first goal we conceded. It was three headers on the bounce. We lose the header from the goal kick, we lose the header from the throw in and then we lose the header for the corner."
SET PLAYS
"We spoke about the importance of set plays, the importance of winning headers and equally, I put a big team on the pitch to try and combat that, so that was extremely frustrating. As the game wore on, we knew it was going to loosen up with 30 minutes to go. You know you can't keep up that pressure all the time. I didn't think we linked the game as well as we could have in the first half, but second half ( when the game started to open up) we brought some of the lads on to move the ball a bit smoother. I thought we deserved a point."
CHANCES
"(For their goal) If he (the defender) doesn't get that I think Ross is coming in off the back of him. i think it was Jack Clarke who put a great ball in. Alex had a free kick that just whistled past the post, Luke O'Nien whistled a few in across the box, so we certainly had our moments. But equally, they had a couple of moments as well."
AN ABNORMAL SEQUENCE OF RESULTS
"There's nothing worse than going in (to the last game) thinking irrespective of what we do, its out of our hands. Let's be honest, in the last six games if you look at the way they have went, it has taken an abnormal sequence of results for us to find ourselves in the position we're in. We've been in really good form, we've picked up a lot of points and we're still going to have to win the next one, which is incredible. At the end of the day, we're up for the fight, we know what we have to do and we go again Saturday."
FORM
"I think we've been in very good form, we're very resilient. We come back, we've got a belief about what we're trying to do. Tonight, with the first goal we conceded, because it's something we focused on during the week, that's obviously a frustration, but you've got to deal with it. You get set backs and you have to deal with them."
FANS
"I thought, certainly towards the end of the game when we were really going for it, I thought the fans really picked the lads up and drove us on. That's probably the loudest noise I've heard in a long time when the goal went in. I think the reason the fans have been so good as well is they've seen the effort the lads are putting in on the pitch. We're utilising the squad and getting them minutes because they need to freshen up from time to time."
BROADHEAD
"Broady today was probably touch and go. In hindsight, I probably shouldn't have played him. But, obviously, we've taken him off and hopefully he'll be able to recover for the weekend and we'll see where we go."
