Manager David Moyes believes the Irons produced a top performance at Sheffield United and he probably had cause to be proud of their efforts after only one previous game in charge.
Rome not being built in a day a comes to mind but – and no doubt I’ll be accused of finding excuses – the new laws on handball and VAR generally continue to go against us.
Seb Haller’s arm of toe is adjudged offside and you miss out on a goal whilst he and Lanzini might well have done better with other chances.
In the end it came down to a goalkeeping/defensive error between Martin and Balbuena which made the difference – such a shame as apart from that we looked a lot more organised at the back.
However, fitness level have to be improved further because we certainly started to run out of steam towards the end – a hangover of course from the Pellegrini era.
Moyes – discussing the match at https://www.whufc.com/news/articles/2020/january/10-january/david-moyes-reflects-sheffield-united-defeat said: “I thought my players played well. I thought they were terrific tonight and I’d say we didn’t deserve to lose and we might even have been disappointed to have drawn in the end.
“I think if we had come here and taken a draw, we’d have been happy because it is such a tough place to come to and Chris has done such a good job here.
“But, for me, I thought we scored a good goal to equalise. I’m a football man and I watch football and I thought Declan Rice did brilliantly well to break through the middle with good power and good strength. Their defender did well to get back and headed it on to Declan. Declan went on, played a good pass and we scored.
“I’m just telling you, I think it’s a really good goal. I think Declan deserves great credit for his strength to get through and for that to happen, from my point of view it’s not right.
“I wouldn’t say I am a great fan of it because I believe that is the way most of the people who watch or play the game are feeling, but we’re having to come to terms with it. I think there are some situations where people who’ve played in it and know about football say
‘That’s not right’ and I think that came into that category.”
“The players did a really good job,” the manager said. “It took us a while to settle in the first 15 or 20 minutes but, when we did, we played some good stuff.
“We were twice through one-on-one with the goalkeeper and you’d be hoping to score at least one of them. Unfortunately, when we got those moments we didn’t take them but I couldn’t fault the players for their effort and determination in keeping on going until the end.
“I’ve told the dressing room they should be proud of their performance. I thought they played well. There have been games when they haven’t played as well away from home. I thought they played well tonight.”
OK, Moyes is trying to polish a turd, but he isn’t deluded. The team played effective football 90% of the game. Take away the mistake for the goal and a VAR decision and it’s an away victory….I wonder if the comments on here would be different ???