Boss Roy Keane was delighted with his side’s performance as they jumped to second in the table via a 2-0 victory over Cardiff at Portman Road. Cardiff manager Dave Jones felt Adam Matthews’s own goal was the turning point in the match.
Keane said: "I thought it was a good performance, I thought it was a good game. It was a good victory. I think we deserved it, once we got past the first 10 minutes when we were under a lot of pressure.
"I enjoyed it and the players reacted well, which I knew they would. I was pleased with the workrate, the strikers did well, the subs who came on did well, against a very good Cardiff team.
"Sometimes you can play teams at the right time and obviously Cardiff are missing some important players, but they’re still a handful and we saw that in the first 10 minutes when we looked like we were never going to get out of our box, let alone our half but we stuck at it.
"I think we did a lot of the basics wrong the other night,” he added, "but I thought we did the basics well today, in terms of defending, closing people down and hold-up play from the strikers.
"Cardiff will win loads of games in this league and we knew we’d have to be at our best today. We weren’t the other night and we got found out.”
The Blues manager was delighted with Connor Wickham’s display with the 17-year-old making his first start of the season: "Connor did well, it’s always a gamble when a player’s been out a long time and not kicked a ball in the reserves. His cameo performances last Tuesday and in the Portsmouth game have just about earned him his start.
"I think he and Jason gave us that foundation today with their workrate, their hold-up play and they often threatened.
"The keeper made a very good save from Connor in the second half. We could say he was unlucky, but I give credit to the keeper, he’s come out and made that save.”
Keane thought Wickham was unlucky not to win a spotkick when he was felled in the first period: "We were unfortunate not to get the penalty in the first half and his general play was very good but he’ll be tired for the next few days because it was a big shift for him. He was on for about 81 minutes and ideally I didn’t want to play him for that long.”
Cardiff manager Dave Jones thought the game was heading towards a goalless draw: "We started brightly. The second half wasn’t the best of games and it probably had a 0-0 look about it.
"I didn’t think they were causing us any problems and we certainly weren’t causing them problems, but you can’t give away the goal that we gave away."
Jones says own goal-scorer Adam Matthews wasn’t the only one to blame for his side’s second defeat in a week but was in no doubt that the own goal was the game’s pivotal moment: "It wasn’t just down to young Adam, other players around him didn’t step up to the plate in the second half.
"But the own goal was the turning point because it lifted everyone around the place, the crowd got behind them and they got a spring in their step.
"There’s no hiding place for anybody in this world, certainly not at this level. It’s a good job he’s a young player so he’s got a long, long time to get over it.
"It’s one of those in your career that you’ll mull over many, many times, but the one thing you can’t do is let it affect you. You can think about it and try not to make the mistake again, but we’ve not got time to mollycoddle anybody, he’s got to learn quick.”
Story syndicated from TWTD.co.uk