Town boss felt his team was made to pay for poor decision making after the 4-1 defeat to Norwich City at Carrow Road. Keane refused to criticise referee Keith Hill for Grant Holt’s controversial first goal or Damien Delaney’s red card just before half-time.

Keane said: “Poor decision making and giving teams a helping hand has cost us. It was a long second half and it was very hard for us to get back into it. We took a bit of a gamble in the last 15 or 20 minutes and we opened the door to conceding more goals.

“It doesn’t matter what I think about the sending off. Let’s not waste our time and energy talking about whether there was cover, whether he actually pulled him back, the ball should have been cleared, simple as that. Same for the first goal.

“I’m not going to sit here and question the officials, there’s been enough of that over the last few weeks from other managers and other countries.”

The Blues boss felt his players made it difficult for themselves: “In any game of football, whether you’re a professional or an amateur, you’ve got to do the basics right and we didn’t do that today, whether that’s for the first couple of goals or the sending off. You make it very hard for yourself.

“At 2-1, even though we’d gifted two goals away, I think we were very much in the game. It was pretty open, they were causing us problems, but I thought we’d be OK. But then there was the sending off not long before half-time.

“We’re not good enough to be giving away goals like that and to be playing with 10 men. We’ve not won the last few games with 11.

“With 10 it wasn’t impossible because at 2-1 we were keeping it tight and trying to nick something on the break or from a set piece, but it wasn’t to be.”

Keane admits that he’s under pressure after four successive defeat and with the Blues having dropped to 16th but says it comes with the territory: “When you lose matches, it creates pressure but that comes with the job. You know that when you come into it and you’ve got to deal with it.”

Norwich manager Paul Lambert was delighted with Canaries hat-trick hero Grant Holt: “I thought Grant was unplayable at times. I thought him and Chris Martin were a handful right from the off and when those two play the way they can do, we’ve always got a chance.”

Story syndicated from TWTD.co.uk

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