Cotterill reflects on Barnet embarrassment

Pompey signed off, as quickly as we had signed on, in this seasons league cup with an embarrassing 1-0 defeat at home against Barnet - a club that only survived relegation from the football league altogether at the end of last season...

All of this in front of just 4464 people!

Given the prices for this game mind people can be excused for not attending, as it was not cheap! Although to be fair, by all accounts PFC did want to lower these ticket prices but it was the counterparts from Barnet who refused to sanction this - a 'bigger slice' of the pie was wanted?

Although surely had tickets been cheaper more would have turned up and more of less would have been gained, hey ho that is another matter this is meant to be about Steve Cotterill's reaction, as he told The Pompey Site, to our defeat...

In a refreshing change, as this is not always the case, he told it as it was - Barnet 'deserved' to win: 'we got what we deserved and got beaten. We worked so hard at Middlesbrough on Saturday, but we didn't look as if we were there from the off against Barnet.

'We didn't look like we wanted to get hurt - that's why we didn't pick up any second balls or win enough challenges. There were too many people passing the buck and not enough of them passing the ball.

'I'm not best pleased and the players know my thoughts.'

We can now 'concentrate on the league' I guess, until the FA cup comes along - and I suspect we crash out early again - seems to be the attitude now?

So long as we 'do well' in our next couple of games he thinks this defeat could work out to be 'a blessing' as a cup run does take its 'toll' on you, especially with such a wafer thin squad: 'only if we do well on Saturday against Brighton and Reading next Tuesday will we look back on this and maybe think being out of the Carling Cup is a blessing.

'You always want a run in the cup, but we had three games in it last year, and it does end up taking its toll.'

Credit where it was due for Barnet though.

And he gave them this: 'it's a great night for Barnet. They did well and we've got to give them credit.'

A 'plus' from the night was the return of Liam Lawrence, who managed 70-minutes.

Now we have to pray that no one suffers any reaction to this game and The Herminator and Tal Ben-Haim, now I never thought I would be saying this, come back from international duty fit and ready to go against Brighton.

A massive improvement will be needed against our south coast rivals or they will muller us at the weekend...

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