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  • 11 months ago
Neil Allen's full-time verdict: Pompey 0 Sheffield Wednesday 2
Transcript
00:00Greetings from Fratton Park where the game is over and I'm watching the
00:06ground staff repairing the pitch. Well what can you say about today's
00:15game? I know that's my responsibility and what I'm employed to do. I'm
00:22just actually struggling to think how the last time Pompey played as badly as
00:28that at Fratton Park. You know you can think about the away games last year West
00:33Brom, Bristol City, Derby, Stoke, the spring straight to mind. They weren't great
00:41in Reading in the Cup here were they last month but if you talk about league
00:45performances at Fratton Park where that that basically drove Pompey to safety
00:51second half of last season and there weren't that many bad results for then
00:55anyway. Today they were just so so bad and it's one of the rare occasions where
01:01nearly every player was horrendous. Sometimes if Pompey, even in days when
01:08Pompey drew 0-0 at home to Mansfield or whatever, you can't really fault
01:13defenders, they've kept a clean sheet, they've done their job, whatever. Today
01:17just everyone wasn't really bad. I said at half time that I thought Swanson was the
01:24only one that gave criticism. It turns out he was substituted at half time with an
01:28illness actually so it wasn't down to his performance. So that's why he came off.
01:33But yeah, and then second half, I thought I gave the man the match to Regan Paul. He
01:40went to Ryback, committed. I thought he did alright Regan Paul actually. And John
01:46Messina mentioned Luke LaRue impressed him when he came on his sub. And also
01:51Matthews and Knight did fine when they came on, didn't they? So they're okay. But so many
01:57players. You look at that team. Nine of that team started against Southampton. Murphy was
02:03injured. Smib was injured. And it was atrocious. Really, really was. Bencini actually got worse
02:10as the game went on. Somehow got worse. Second half he had a lot of the ball. He didn't have
02:16much of the ball first half, which is not all his own fault. Second half he had so much of
02:21the ball on the left. And his use of it was shocking. So many over-hit crosses from the
02:28left to the far post and out of play. Or just over the bar. It was really poor. And obviously
02:36he was involved in the build-up where he fell over when he was making a cross from the box
02:40and then they broke and scored. Mainly because of shock when I see his hamstring going. But
02:45there were just so many. John Swift, who's passing the first half was shocking. And rightly
02:53came out at half-time. No one can dispute that. Yeah, I thought he was his best game at Southampton
02:57a week earlier. And so many of these players who did so well at St. Mary's in a goal of straw.
03:02Just unrecognisable today. And that's what the shocking thing was about today. Really,
03:07really was. And I know people will pick on Ben Killip and it clearly should have been better
03:12for that first goal. Free kick. He starts going to his right and then Bannon hits it the other
03:17way, doesn't he? He should have done better that free kick there. But he actually made
03:21a few saves that kept the scoreline down, if anything. But it was atrocious. It really,
03:29really was. I can't. Actually, I could get a thesaurus and keep repeating all those words
03:34over and over again, which I normally do. But there's nothing you can take out of this game
03:38really. It was as bad as that. And everybody knows that. Pompey were booed at the final
03:43whistle. Perfectly understandable, considering the manner of that performance. And they never
03:49looked like getting back into it. There was one Bishop header cleared off the line. Keep
03:54made a couple of saves as well from Bishop. All came from corners, which was Pompey's most,
03:59the biggest threat, which is not to say a lot these days. They don't normally win the ball
04:04much in the air from corners, do they? From open play, just absolutely nothing from Pompey.
04:08Just give it to being Cheney, knock out of play. That's what it was. So poor. So that's
04:16all you can say, isn't it, really? You can't. Darren says, worst game I've seen for a long
04:20time. Definitely a threatened part. Darren, again, is clearly very angry. The pits of
04:25the game. Yeah, I agree with everything you say in there, Darren. Just absolutely stunned.
04:31John Messina afterwards, he was surprised at that. And he saw worrying signs of complacency
04:37among his team as well. And you can understand that. So I know Philip will get a bit of criticism
04:43for his poor kicking, and it was poor again. So I know that. But it was much more than him.
04:51Much more. So many players. Conor Chaplin was poor. Segesic was poor. Bishop. Oh, you can go through the whole team, can't you?
04:59But I gave the lowest ratings to Swift in his 45 minutes and Biaccini, who deteriorated as a game
05:08wore on, bizarrely. Yes. So back to the drawing board. It just seems strange, doesn't it, really?
05:14How everyone's so infused and heartened after that resort at Southampton. And then you come to this and it's just dreadful.
05:20And it's up and down at the moment. You have to try to stay level, don't you? Level-headed through it all.
05:25But it's hard not to after today's abject performance. Worse for a long time at Fratton Park.
05:32Sorry about the display. Awful. Thank you.
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