Hull City head coach has spoken of his disappointment at losing this weekend’s clash with Nottingham Forest.
Hosting Mark Warburton’s side at the KCOM Stadium for the tie, Forest took the lead just ahead of the half hour mark and we then fell two nil down with just under 20 minutes remaining in the game.
Despite goals from Jarrod Bowen and Michael Hector inside of the final 30, Forest had an 83rd minute penalty that had put the tie beyond us, but we did have greater chances on the day and that was where Slutsky’s frustration came from.
Speaking to the Official Site as he met with the media post game, the Russian explained.
‘It is a very difficult game to analyse straight away and a strange match. We had a plan and I think our plan worked because we controlled the second ball zone and we had a lot of chances. We made some mistakes with our last pass, but when we conceded the first goal we needed to continue to play actively and our plan continued to work with chances created.’
Slutsky went on to say.
‘If we could have made it 1-1 it would have become a new game. We tried to come back from 2-0 and 3-1 and I don’t have a problem with the character of the players or the team spirit. We made some mistakes and this is my first problem. We missed chances, but we had a lot of chances. Nottingham Forest took their chances, we didn’t.’
With a double substitution at half time, he explained.
‘We needed to keep a very high level of activity in the central space and control the second ball zone. We needed fresh players to control this space. I felt we did that.’
Slutsky also had issues with the penalty award but he wasn’t going to air them to the press, instead insisting he ‘respected’ the referee’s decision.
Despite the disappointment, he did have praise for Jarrod Bowen who made it eight goals for the season so far.
‘It’s difficult to speak about individual moments when we have lost the game, but the goal on its own was an unbelievable finish and he deserved to win the club’s man-of-the-match award today.’
He also confirmed that Jon Toral had picked up a hamstring in jury and it looked like he would be out for the next month on initial assessments.
In his own post game conference, Hector called on the side to bounce back when we face Middlesbrough on home soil in midweek.
‘We need to put on a good performance for the fans against Middlesbrough. We were all disappointed to leave the KCOM at the weekend with no points, so we need to get a result on Tuesday so that we don’t have that feeling again. There wasn’t a lot between the teams on Saturday, really Forest had three chances and took them all. It was a tough one to take for us because we made mistakes and were punished for them.’
He went on to say.
‘We started the game well but didn’t take our chances and when that happens, you have to make sure you stay in the game but we went 2-0 down. The first goal knocked us and we didn’t keep the ball well enough after that. We showed character to get back into it and even when I scored I felt that we would get the equaliser but it wasn’t to be. After winning at Barnsley, it was disappointing not to back it up at home. We’ve got another game coming around quickly and that is good. Middlesbrough will come here in a good mood after winning at the weekend so we have to be strong and look to bounce back.’
