Fleetwood Town’s head coach Joey Barton spoke after Town’s 1-0 loss away at Southend United on Saturday afternoon.
Barton’s side lost their first game since the opening day defeat to AFC Wimbledon, and it was Simon Cox’s second half goal that was the difference at Roots Hall on a wet and windy day in Essex.
The Cod Army missed a few chances in the first-half with Paddy Madden and Ched Evans going close, and with a penalty claim turned down, it just wasn’t meant to be for Fleetwood and the club move on and look forward to the visit of Barnsley next weekend.
Here are the key quotes from Joey’s post-match interview…
His thoughts on the game…
“I think the game was just like the weather: damp, miserable, and very disappointing.
“It is a game that should have finished 0-0 and we were lucky in the first period in terms of us being really sloppy and not being precise in what we were doing and from that we allowed the game to drag us in.
“The disappointing thing for us is that the mistakes you want it to come from the opposition and their good play, and strong pressure, and it wasn’t and we’ve shot ourselves in the foot.
“We’ve given Southend the points, and it will be a learning curve for us now and as I have always said, we win or we learn and from today’s game, we need to learn a lot before our match next weekend against Barnsley.”
On the mistake that lead to the goal…
“I personally don’t think it is about individuals, it is about the team and it was a mistake from the team.
“There was a lot of people connected to the play and I won’t blame any individual. We win or we lose as a team and there are a lot of things we could have done differently in the build up to their goal.
“We now have the chance to respond to this result against a very good side in Barnsley, and it will be a tough test. You want to put games behind you straight away.”
On the red card, and Hunter’s fifth yellow…
“Ash picked up a booking and we have spoken to him about tidying that up in the bookings that he has had this season. There hasn’t been much malice in his cards and it is disappointing that he will now miss a game.
“Today I didn’t think there was a sending off warranted, [Wallace] went to get the ball and again, he hasn’t gone in with any malice and James is gutted. I am disappointed for him too as he has got going on the pitch, and unfortunately, the rules of the game say it’s a card.
“We now need to dust ourselves down and make sure we are even stronger going into our next game.”