FC Halifax Town 0-2 Woking: “It just wasn’t good enough” - Wild admits Shaymen were well below par

First-half goals from Max Kretzsshmer and Jake Hyde saw Woking cruise to victory against a poor Halifax side who never really threatened to get back into the match.

“What frustrates me most is we worked yesterday on how we were going to play, shortening things up, getting balls into centre-forwards’ feet, and we just didn’t do it,” said a frustrated Town boss.

”But before you do that, you’ve got to run harder than them, win more tackles than them, win more headers than them, and we didn’t do any of that first-half.

“We were just so far off it. It’s frustrating.

“Woking have done nothing to win the game, it’s been a drab game of football, but we gifted them two goals and they walk away winning 2-0 happy as Larry.

“I’m sat here thinking ‘we work on things and we just don’t do it’ so I’ve got to now revisit that and see why they didn’t implement what we wanted.”

When asked why his side had been so poor, Wild said: “I’m not an excuse-maker, it just wasn’t good enough.

“The players might say to you ‘the pitch was tough on Tuesday’ or ‘we only played Tuesday night’ - load of rubbish, you’re paid to play football, you’re paid to look after your bodies and they should be ready and raring to go.

“We haven’t taken our chance today.”

On the challenge that awarded Woking a penalty after a quarter of an hour, Wild said: “It was a pen in my eyes. But it was an underhit goal kick, we’ve had chances to press the ball, don’t press the ball, and then he rides three challenges, we dangle a leg, and it’s a pen.

“It was systematic of us first-half, we weren’t aggressive enough.

“I’d said to them yesterday and today ‘if you’re more aggressive than them, you’ll win the football match’ and they weren’t, they were too easy to play against.

“That’s just ridiculously frustrating.”

And on Woking’s second goal just before the interval, Wild said: “I’ve been saying to them ‘Hyde’s a threat in the box, and don’t let him turn and spin in the box’.

“We don’t defend the first header and we let Hyde turn and strike in the box.
“You get what you deserve. I can only tell them what I think, if they don’t implement it, it’s very difficult to change.

“But I’ll go back to the drawing board. One thing about me, I’ll look at me first and see what could we have done better as a team, and I’ll make sure we put it right for next week.”

The Shaymen had only one shot on target in the match, although Devante Rodney headed against the bar in the second-half.

“Not winning enough headers and tackles at one end, and not putting the ball in the box quickly, or breaking our neck to get in the box quickly enough, so we got what we deserved,” Wild said.

When asked what he had said to his side after the game, Wild replied: “Not good enough. We looked like a team that didn’t want to be third in the first-half, and looked like a team that was half-a-yard off.

“I always say, if you’re half-a-yard off you won’t get anything.

“There’s two types of bravery in football, there’s putting your head in where it hurts, and there’s getting on the ball when they’re compact, and in shape, and wanting to move the ball on quickly to create opportunities.

“We didn’t do both. There was nothing in the game, and they win 2-0. Not the greatest of days for us.”