Wayne Rooney’s response to Birmingham City’s 4-2 loss to Blackburn Rovers is included in the most recent news from BirminghamLive.
During Birmingham City’s loss to Blackburn Rovers, Wayne Rooney criticised the team’s “schoolboy” defence.
Rovers’ 4-2 victory at Ewood Park was largely due to a disastrous 15 minutes for Blues, who suffered their seventh consecutive away loss. In the course of fifteen minutes in the second half, Rovers took a 3-0 lead thanks to goals from James Hill and Sammie Szmodics.
Blues had hope for a comeback thanks to Siriki Dembele’s brace, but Harry Leonard sealed Blackburn’s victory in stoppage time. “From our perspective, the goals were extremely inadequate,” stated Rooney. “We were excellent for the majority of the game and gave Blackburn a lot of trouble. But they are schoolboy objectives. Naturally, I accept responsibility for it, but we need to improve as midfielders, defenders, and goalkeepers. We cannot continue to give up goals like that to opposing teams.
“I thought we really subdued their crowd in the first half, and although I told the players not to give them momentum or encouragement to get up, we actually did the exact opposite. It’s difficult to accept defeat here after such a successful
No sooner had the third goal been scored than Rooney hooked Austrian defender Emanuel Aiwu. The Blues manager reiterated the importance of increased focus while avoiding assigning blame.
He added: “I’m not going to sit up here and hammer players because ultimately I’m picking the team and working with the players, and it’s my responsibility, but it’s also my responsibility to get it right. As a team and as individuals, when the lads are doing what I’m asking them to do we’re very difficult to play against.
“You may have noticed that I keep talking about concentration and focus. The minute that goes, we’re back on the defensive and not playing aggressively. For example, in the fourth goal, we had the opportunity to track the player to the line, but we chose to let him turn, which allowed the pitch to open up. We’re very difficult to play against when we’re doing it.
We simply become distracted for a brief moment and suffer the consequences. I’m not happy with the objectives. John is aware that the third goal was the result of an individual mistake, but there were two or three opportunities to stop it in the other three goals; we simply lost concentration and didn’t.
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