Some model game mismangement sees a draw snatched from the jaws of victory
It was so close to being the perfect away day.
Instead, we were left with that unmistakable, gut-wrenching feeling that accompanies a draw that feels like a defeat.
So close. Just two or three better decisions with the ball, a for-once-acceptable hoof into opposition territory, the taking of the ball into the corner to waste a few valuable seconds and, the biggie, choosing not to try and dribble through a crowd of players when there was a simple pass on.
We could chuck a lino’s flag for a dubious offside into that same mix, but I’m not going to dwell on that because if any/all of the above had been achieved, there would have been no floaty cross and a Weimann run for him to even make a decision on.
It’s probably worth remembering that we may well have got away with one in the minute or so after Ante Crnac’s brilliant goal when Jack Stacey and Jacob Wright combined to clumsily bundle over Ohashi on the very edge or inside the box.
Rightly or wrongly, I was amazed that referee Leigh Doughty didn’t award a pen. But the lessons were not learnt.
Such a shame.
Here we are discussing some daft decision-making in the last five minutes of the game when I should be writing about all the good things that happened in the preceding 90 and how we went toe-to-toe with a top-six side on their patch and emerged the better side.
When the dust settles and the pain subsides, there was a performance there that portrayed perfectly the progress this group is making, particularly in terms of controlling the tempo and direction of a game.
It wasn’t perfect – for a side that prides itself on keeping the ball, they don’t half give it away cheaply at times – but the way they were able to shift the ball quickly through the thirds and stretch the Blackburn defence was just how Johannes Hoff Thorup demands.
Like I said, plenty of good on show that mustn’t be lost behind the crushing disappointment of those injury-time minutes. And again, delivered with a midfield shorn of two of its three key cogs until Emi Marcondes’s timely return in the 88th minute.
Timely because it was he who ran onto Borja Sainz’s nicely weighted through ball and dug out the most perfect of cut-backs into the stride of Crnac. And, in the minutes that followed, it was he who wisely attempted to waste a few minutes with the ball in the corner while teammates ignored the obvious in favour of risky dribbles and trying to force passes that were not there.
A masterclass in game management, it was not.
