City striker Jamie Cureton has bemoaned his luck in front of goal as the dust settles on yet another early cup exit for the Canaries.
On a night to forget at a wet and windy Gigg Lane, Cureton failed to find the net for the 10th time in 12 matches but had two glorious opportunities to level the tie with last night's FA Cup third round replay finely poised.
If he had found the net, it could have been a different story but last year's Championship golden boot winner just isn't getting the rub of the green at the moment and, as we all know, the Canaries crashed to a shock 2-1 defeat.
In fairness, he came up against a keeper in form in Shakers stopper Jim Provett but the 32-year-old will want to become a more permanent fixture on the scoresheet sooner rather than later.
“The first one I tried to lift over him he saved, and the second one I caught very well and he managed to get a hand to it. At the moment, that's my luck I suppose,” said Cureton.
“After that, nothing dropped until late on when I got the header at the back stick and hopefully it was going to go in, but I just directed it as best I could and Dion touched it in.
“But it was too late. If there was 10 minutes to go, maybe we could have forced extra time but we wouldn't have deserved it.
“The keeper made saves at vital times, and we missed little opportunities and probably when we got around the box we didn't make the right decisions.”
The former Reading and Colchester striker admitted after the final whistle that this latest defeat was a particularly bitter pill to swallow.
A defeat to lower league opposition is never easy to take. But an FA Cup humbling to a managerless side who sit only a few places above the League Two relegation trapdoor is a tad embarrassing to say the least.
“You want to be winning games and stay in the Cup and when you're playing lower league opposition you think it's an opportunity to move forward. It hurts, I'm gutted, it was a disappointing night to be fair,” admitted the Bristol-born forward.
“We played very much below-par and they played a lot better than they have been in their league and that is what happens in the cup.
“We played a different formation with a few players coming in after Saturday, but we just didn't get going. Whether it was the changes we made and people took their time getting into the game I don't know.
“I felt comfortable before they scored but we didn't start well at all. We were keeping the ball well but weren't really penetrating a lot. But when you're doing that, you feel the chances will come, and then we conceded a sloppy goal.
“The pressure starts to mount, we were giving passes away, making wrong decisions and caused our own problems.
“I think you can hold your hands up if you've played well and been beaten by a better side but when you perform below-par, that's when it becomes disappointing and when people become frustrated.”
Cureton also pointed the finger at the fringe players who came, saw but didn't quite conquer in Lancashire last night.
Ryan Jarvis and Michael Spillane were given rare chances to impress but they failed to make an impression and the Canary favourite admitted City boss Glenn Roeder was not a happy man afterwards.
“People who haven't played have been given chances, people haven't taken them, and the manager's very frustrated. He wants us to perform every week and he was very annoyed in there. He has every right to be.”
“In these sort of games, if you don't start well and don't play at a high tempo and play as you would in a normal league game, then you come up with results like this.
“We had little spells but I don't think we really created anything in the first half. I don't think I had a shot.
“In the second half we got back on top of it but conceded a terrible goal and we were 2-0 down and chasing the game again.
“We got something but it wasn't until late on and that was it – the game was over. As a whole, we just didn't perform.”
This latest setback should prove something of a wake-up call to the Norfolk club. After all, Canary fans were dreaming of the play-offs after Saturday's excellent performance – and result – at Barnsley.
But with City still only four points clear of the relegation zone, any thoughts of a late surge into the top six will be a long way from supporters' thoughts after the abject display at Gigg Lane.
“I don't think we've ever got carried away to be fair,” Cureton added. “Even though we've done very well recently we still know we're in a dogfight. We still need to pick up a lot more points.”
Tom Haylett
Leave a Reply