John Gregory takes the blame for Crawley’s terrible display

Crawley Town manager John Gregory refused to blame the players for the abject display which was one of the worst defeats ever suffered at home.
Crawley Town V Rochdale (Pic by Jon Rigby) SUS-140809-134842002Crawley Town V Rochdale (Pic by Jon Rigby) SUS-140809-134842002
Crawley Town V Rochdale (Pic by Jon Rigby) SUS-140809-134842002

Instead the former Aston Villa boss took responsibility for the performance and said he had to do better.

He said: “I have to take full responsibility for the outcome of that I want to apologise to the fans, some of whom stayed until the very last minute.

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“I have to apologise for their performance, for the way we set-up, the tactics, the substitutions and the overall very poor performance. I certainly won’t duck the issue.

Crawley Town V Rochdale (Pic by Jon Rigby) SUS-140809-134648002Crawley Town V Rochdale (Pic by Jon Rigby) SUS-140809-134648002
Crawley Town V Rochdale (Pic by Jon Rigby) SUS-140809-134648002

“I don’t think I’ve ever been involved in a game where I’ve lost at home by that score.

“The fans were singing that they were embarrassed. I am more embarrassed than they are.

“We were getting overrun in the centre midfield and I brought in young Mitch Rose to sit in there and try and do a holding job for us. That side of it worked but it opened up other areas.

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“We certainly didn’t defend as well as we have been doing. In the first three matches of the season we were watertight.

“We were very open today If you look at the stats I think in the second half they had five opportunities and four of them. I wish we had that ratio at the other end.

“We didn’t particularly look like scoring at all which is worrying trend which has surfaced in the last couple of games.

“We scored twice in the JPT on Tuesday night but that was against slightly inferior opposition and I didn’t get too carried away by that.

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“I always stand by my players but it was hard to recognise any of my boys today.”

“We’ve had nine games in 29 days and have played the same players. Players carrying injuries really shouldn’t have played and that was very evident in the performance today.

“There were a lot of tired legs, tired bodies, tired minds.

“But you cannot afford to have a result like that. Everybody needs to pick themselves up and get ready for next week.

“It will be luxury to go a week without a football match. That was by far the worst performance I’ve had since I’ve been here. It’s going to be a long week for me personally and I get paid to make sure we keep winning every week and I need to get it right.”

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