Town manager Kieran McKenna has disclosed that the Blues were issued an apology by the authorities last week concerning Preston’s first two goals in their 3-2 loss at Deepdale on Saturday.
Referee Graham Scott failed to see anything suspicious, even though captain Sam Morsy looked to have been fouled by Will Keane prior to the first goal, which was scored by the former Town striker, in the fifth minute.
Then, three minutes later, there was a blatant offside in the build-up to the second goal, which George Edmundson unintentionally placed past Vaclav Hladky; assistant referee James Mainwaring failed to see it either.
When asked about the apology, McKenna responded, “Yes, I think it was stated that both first goals shouldn’t have counted and I think that’s clear watching it back.”
“The second goal is obviously offside, while the first goal is a blatant foul that eliminates the huge deflection on the shot from 28 yards.
“It’s always going to be hard, but when those two incidents occur in the first seven minutes of the game, it’s even harder than I indicated at the time. It is possible to give us credit for how we recovered from that circumstance.
Despite the fact that the first two goals of the Preston match slightly threw off the start of the match, it is hardly the first time this season that Town has started a game slowly or let the opposition take the lead.
“It has two sides to it,” McKenna thought. You may argue that we got off to a sluggish start in the game, but that was only because two goals in the first seven minutes should have been disallowed.
“There may be instances, but it wasn’t like the players weren’t rushing or playing aggressively at times.
“I believe that quite a few of our games this season have included unplanned incidents, callbacks from the officials, spectacular goals, or individual mistakes—all of which are normal occurrences in a football game.
However, we don’t deny that there have been more games than we would have liked where we have given up the opening goal, particularly while playing away from home.
We have examined this and will keep looking at it because, particularly in a few of the away games, we haven’t been able to establish a foothold in the game as steadily as we would have liked to in the early going.
We constantly assess the team’s performance and look for areas for improvement, but we also acknowledge that football is not always a predictable sport.
“The players prepared for the game exceptionally well last week, and I have no concerns about their attitude or level of enthusiasm when the game begins. They had a poor start after they scored a deflected goal from 28 yards that should have been a free kick.
“I believe there have been a few of those, but we’ve also identified some other things that we’ll look into to improve our chances of getting a good footing in the game.”
Only one of Town’s previous eight league games have been wins. This is comparable to the same period last year, which preceded the incredible 15-game run of 13 wins, 2 draws, and promotion.
When questioned if the current state of affairs and the previous year’s sticky spell were comparable, McKenna said that they weren’t.
McKenna thought, “I think you’re going to have different phases in seasons anyway.” “In general, you’re not going to have a phase where you win all of your games all of the time over a 46-game season; maybe one team will this year.”
The league suffered its first defeat in six games and its first in 2024 on Saturday.
“You’ll go through phases in any case, and this division will go through phases for sure.
Therefore, we don’t really need any guarantee, but we did have some similar stages last season, including injuries and player absences during the winter.
We’re currently attempting to fully integrate new signings into the club, which takes time, so I doubt you’ll witness our best effort in that regard in a week.
Thus, we’re attempting to achieve that while having a group that is as fit as possible and recovering players from injuries.
“There are a lot of things you can take, like playing on a challenging football pitch last week and continuing to compete in a really tough division where every game is tough and compete at times when things go against you like they did with two decisions last week.
“We were aware going into the season that there may be periods in which you don’t win as many games.
We’re quite consistent in sticking to the daily tasks, acting appropriately, and maintaining the proper culture and attitude in the building because of this. I like our job on a daily basis and am looking forward to taking each game as it comes. We carried out that last year and are carrying it out this year.
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