Man United 3 Ipswich Town 2: Kieran McKenna admits Blues missed big opportunity to record rare win at Old Trafford on frustrating night
Ipswich Town boss Kieran McKenna admitted the Blues missed a big opportunity to record a rare win at Old Trafford and also to gain ground in the relegation battle following their 3-2 defeat to 10-man Manchester United.
The Suffolk visitors had the game where they wanted it at half-time, having pulled back to 2-2 and with the Red Devils reduced in number following Patrick Dorgu’s dismissal for a high challenge on Omari Hutchinson.
But Town conceded a third set piece of the match two minutes after the restart, Harry Maguire heading home and from there struggled to make any impact.
“No doubt about it,” McKenna admitted when asked whether it was an opportunity missed. “Certainly a very frustrating outcome to the game and we’re really annoyed with the goals that we conceded.
“In the first half with the two set plays. I think the first one is a really good ball, we’re not sure it’s a free-kick, but it’s a good ball. The second one, there’s a block at the back post but we need to defend it better.
“We went from a really good start and a good position in the game to a difficult position. Of course, we go in at half-time in a good position with the red card and the goal just before half-time.
“But we’ve managed and played the second half really poorly. A big priority in the dressing room at half-time was not to concede. We were in the situation [the same as United] two weeks ago against Aston Villa, so we know what the mindset of the opponent is, you know that they’re waiting for an opportunity and they’ll feel like there’s a goal in it for them.
“And tonight the goal was always going to come from a set play. We weren’t able to deal with United’s physicality and strength in the penalty box.
“So not giving away the set play and then defending it with everything we had was going to be key in the second half when it came, and we didn’t do that within a minute of the restart.
“And that gives the stadium all the energy it needs, gives the opposition all the energy they need and I think in the second half they showed their experience, showed their quality.
“They were stronger than us at both ends of the pitch. They still had three big, high quality centre-halves to defend their goal. Their two centre-forwards were stronger than us on long balls and we weren’t able to get any foothold in the game.
“We didn’t manage the situation well in the second half. We did everything that we didn’t want to do and you don’t want to do in that situation. We gave away free-kicks, we gave the crowd energy by getting involved in silly things. We lost our shape and we didn’t defend the moments that they had anywhere near well enough. It’s a really poor second half from us and a frustrating night.”
Asked what he’d said to the players in the dressing room, McKenna responded: “Everything I’ve just said to you!”
Having said at the weekend that the Blues have rarely had the rub of the green this season, they were gifted Jaden Philogene’s early goal through a defensive mix-up and then played a United side with 10 men for the whole of the second half and the last couple of of minutes of the first.
“I think that’s fair,” McKenna reflected. “We’ve lost out on margins on so many occasions this season, games where we’ve done lots of good things.
“Tonight was similar to that in that there were some good passages in the first half, some good things about our play, some promise.
“Situations have very often gone against us. Tonight, in some aspects they went for us and we weren’t good enough to capitalise on them. One, in terms of the physicality to defend our box on set plays, they had too much strength for us in those areas.
“And then the maturity to be able to handle the situation of being in the second half with the expectation to go and win the game.
“We gave away a really poor goal and we didn’t chase the game well at all. I think there are plenty of nights and plenty of days this season where we can bemoan that things haven’t gone our way, but I don’t think tonight was one of them.
“I think we need to take ownership of it tonight. Although it’s not easy, even 10 men here you’re still playing against high, high quality opposition, but we need to own the bits we can do better and there were certainly a couple of those tonight.”
He added: “The feeling in our position, the reality in our position is that we need to do so many things well to win a game. Maybe 10 things and you need to do them all well.
“Very often this season we’ve done seven or eight of them or nine of them, but if one area of your game is off, then you’ll get punished.
“Defensive set plays have been a strong point for us, we’ve been one of the best teams in the league from a defensive set piece point of view, but really tonight we weren’t at the level, the opponent was too strong for us and we got punished on that area.
“We know the jump that we’ve had, we know we’re coming here with lots of young players, very few have played in the league before, very few have played at Old Trafford before, but we also know that we need to get so many areas right to get a win and very often we’ve got different areas right, but not all of them.
“And tonight’s one of those nights. We did some things well in the first half, we gave away very, very few chances in open play but the defending of set plays was not good enough and has cost us the game.”
Before tonight, Town had conceded only three goals from set pieces with Brentford the only side to have shipped fewer, two, in the Premier League this season.
“That’s why tonight’s really, really frustrating,” the former United U18s and first-team coach continued.
“There’s also the level of the opponent and maybe that’s one of the points with the level of the Premier League.
“Bruno Fernandes delivering for Harry Maguire and [Matthijs] de Ligt and [Leny] Yoro, [Joshua] Zirkzee and [Rasmus] Hojlund. That’s a lot of physicality in your penalty box and from a stature point of view we were outmatched tonight, so our details need to be absolutely perfect and that wasn’t the case tonight.
“I think it’s an area that has certainly cost us tonight, it hasn’t cost us all season, but, as I’ve said, to win games in this league, we have to be bang on in pretty much every area and we haven’t managed to be as often as we would have liked to be and tonight it was certainly defending set plays that was a big problem for us.”
Regarding the challenge which led to Dorgu’s sending off, McKenna added: “I think it was a red card. I was right in front of it. He’s gone over the ball.
“I think you always assume the best in people and I assume he’s not meant it, but he’s gone over the ball and it’s also resulted in Omari having to go off in the second half and he’s a big, big player for us against a lower block.
“That was a blow for us, but VAR dealt with it and gave the red card, so we can’t have too many complaints and hopefully Omari will be OK.”
The Blues boss was asked how he’ll lift the team ahead of Monday’s FA Cup fifth round tie at Nottingham Forest, given he seemed flat at his post-match press conference.
“We are tonight and I think we have to be,” he said. “We’re a really positive group, we find the positives and the learnings from both situations but also we’ve missed a big opportunity tonight, so there’s no point trying to dress that up any other way than what it is.
“We’re really frustrated tonight and I don’t think there’s anything that any of us say that’s going to change that, but I also know that when we go back into training everyone’s mood, everyone’s mindset will be to deal with that frustration in the right way.
“Take the lessons from tonight, there’s a lot that we can take, there were so many different things in the game, the ebbs and flows, the big incidents that were in the game. There’s so much that a young group in terms of experience and age can learn from that.
“And we have to use it to make us stronger and we have to use the lessons in the game coming up.
“We’re frustrated tonight, there’s no point hiding any of that, but I know when we get back to the training ground, we’ll all turn our focus to Nottingham Forest in the cup and then really importantly take the lessons from tonight ready for Selhurst Park in 10 days’ time.”
