Port Vale 1-0 Milton Keynes reaction – “We’ll take the positives…”
Reaction from manager Darrell Clarke, matchwinner Aaron Donnelly and from the opposition after Saturday’s game at Vale Park…
Darrell Clarke
It was an average performance but I thought we deserved to win the game, we were the better team and their goalkeeper pulled off two excellent saves in the second-half.
Compared to the last two performances, when we got beat, it wasn’t near that standard – it is a strange old game.
We weren’t hanging on; I thought if we had got a second it would have been a more comfortable afternoon, though.
I don’t think Stoney had a shot on target to deal with, we defended strongly, but we will take that after getting no points in the last two for better performances.
The last three performances have been decent; if I am being honest, this has been the worst of the three but we got the three points, a 1-0 at home, so we take the positives because we were comfortable for the majority of the game.
Aaron Donnelly
While the goal went in there was a minute’s applause for a death that happened, so I really hope that his family are really pleased and he’s looking down.
I was absolutely buzzing when the ball hit the back of the net, it was bobbling around the box and Wozz took a shot on goal and it’s landed to me.
It just fell to my right foot, it fell nice on the volley as well, and thankfully, it went in the bottom corner, the goalkeeper nearly got it, but I was wheeling away in celebration.
Mark Jackson – Milton Keynes manager
We have to start winning, there’s no hiding. The supporters deserve better than that.
I said it after the Ipswich game, and though we got the equaliser against Lincoln, we didn’t do that today. We’ve not caused them enough threat, or caused them enough problems attacking, and we conceded a sloppy goal from a set-play.
There’s an apprehension with some players, that’s not new or some players but it is with others, and we have to find a way of dealing with that.
t was a really tough game, in difficult conditions against a difficult team. We’re disappointed obviously with the position we’re in. We know we have to get results and we have to get them quickly.
Today wasn’t good enough collectively. We’ve got the fix it and put it right. We’ll be doing everything we can to ensure we can turn this around and we achieve our goal by winning games.
We have to learn how to start games better rather than going behind and coming together. We didn’t show anywhere near our potential today, no-where near it. We have to do that as a group.
Daniel Harvie – Milton Keynes player
We can’t wait until the second-half to start playing, we need to come out aggressive on the front foot and take it to teams.
It feels like a goal goes in and we wake up, and we realise it’s time to get back into the game. That has to go, and that has to go quick. We can’t start games like that. We need to want it more than the other team.
We’ve been sloppy on the ball, not playing into the right areas, we couldn’t clear balls, we were shanking it, we weren’t dealing with it. It should be bread and butter. We’ve got to earn the right to play the way we want to play. But we cannot start like that.