Shrewsbury Town

Shrewsbury Town boss Micky Mellon admitted he was ‘angry’ and ‘stunned’ following his side’s heavy 7-1 defeat at Chesterfield.

Town were three goals down at the break following a double from Jay O’Shea and a Lee Novak strike. That opening 45 also saw Town lose influential due Anthony Gerrard and Abu Ogogo to hamstring injuries and, despite Zak Whitbread’s goal giving Salop a ray of hope, a double from substitute Rai Simons and another two from Novak completed a bad start to 2016 for Town.

“I don’t think anybody has seen that coming today,” said Micky.

“I’m trying to be as honest as I possibly can.

“We lose two players to injuries early.

“I don’t believe that we did anything that has got us any kind of success. Right from the outset we looked to wide open with too much distances between the back four as a unit and the midfield two.

“All over the pitch it didn’t look like what we’d built on over the last 10 or 11 games and pretty much everything that could’ve gone against us has gone against us.

“There were moments where, because it’s a 4-4-2 against a 4-4-2, you’ve got to be good in those one v one situations because you’re playing against League One players. We had to do better. We looked too wide open on the counter attack.

“They’ve got very good pace up front so you’ve got to be better organised at the back.

“We spoke about that before the game. You’ve got to be better organised from the start at the back to try and counter that. But too many times we reacted on it rather than anticipated it.

“We’ve got to be better organised than that and to be fair with the amount of what we have put in and the experience we have there that should be a given.”

Despite the score line, Micky confessed that going into the changing room ranting and raving is not something he feels would be productive.

He said: “It’s difficult because it is what it is. You’re not going to fix it at the end of the game. You’ve got to try and salvage something out of it. We’re obviously massively, massively disappointed, probably shocked is the word as well. We’re disappointed for the fans that have made this journey here.

“That’s all of the things we’ve got to think about. It was a shock to us as it is to everyone else but there’s not an awful lot we can do about it now other than as we have to do as managers, look over it and see what we haven’t done that we’ve done in previous weeks and try and remind the players of that.

“The last thing you want to be doing now is going in there and obliterating dressing rooms and start flinging things around because it’s too late for that. That’s not the way it’s got to be done. We’ve got to try and salvage something out of it and hopefully get a reaction to it.

“Some of the goals that we gave away – I don’t really know how you legislate for them all. Some of the defending, the one v one and like I say the organisation to deal with the counter attack and to give two penalties away and have a man sent off.

On the two penalties, the latter of which saw Junior Brown dismissed for a second yellow card, is something the boss feels is irrelevant at this point.

“The score line is what it is. Whether I know if they’re penalties, the referee has given them. Are they penalties? I’d maybe question the second one but that’s not what people want to be hearing to be dealing with individual moments. We’ve be beaten very heavily and it’ll be disappointing for a lot of people.

Micky admitted that losing influential players like Gerrard and Ogogo was bound to have an impact on his side and admits the defeat hurts everyone associated with the club.

“We’ll never know what things might have been like if we’d kept them on. We all know how important they’ve been to us over the last 10 or 11 games.

“They’re very important players for us. The very reasons why we brought Gerrard in was for moments like that when we have to be better organised, better as a unit, better as a back four and better as a group. We need leaders in there and when he goes off you see the impact of losing a player like that.

“We’re thoroughly disappointed. It’s a performance that isn’t acceptable, not from a group of League One players and it’s not a performance that represents what we’re trying to do as a football club.

“It’s certainly a pride battler. It should hurt, it should be very difficult for you to get over as it will be but there’s not an awful lot that can be done about it now. We’ll comb over it like we always do but I’ll see what everybody else has seen today. Those moments that needed to be defended of a standard that was fitting of a game at this level – we were short.

“We’re all stunned and very angry. So you should be because if you care about the team and you care about the football club and your own professional pride then you should be.

“We’ve been better organised than that. We’ve been better as individuals and better as a group than that.

“I take my responsibility. I’m a proud guy and at the end of the day the team represents me. But the difficult thing that you have to get your head around in football is when you get performances like that where you don’t see it coming - there’s not an awful lot you can do about it. It was pretty much the same team that went to Crewe. We’ve all seen how organised and how well we performed there but to see some of the bits of play that we got punished for today was very uncharacteristic.

“Is an apology the right thing to do? I think so because people have paid to come over and watch us play and represent their club and Town better than what we did today. There was moments in the game where we would have to say individuals haven’t done their jobs that we’ve asked them to do but I don’t think that’s through lack of effort or lack of fire.

“It’s painful and embarrassing but you’ve got to try and move on and keep the players together and keep as one and remind everybody of the last 10/11 game get us back on that as quickly as we can.”