Waterford United suffered their first defeat of the season when they conceded a late goal to Shelbourne on Friday night last. The Waterford manager, Stephen Henderson was disappointed when he spoke after the game but nevertheless he was able to take some positives from the performance and remains upbeat about the future.
“I am really disappointed. I felt we competed with them for the entire match and we were the team who created all of the chances. Unfortunately we switched off near the end and they punished us. A good side will punish a team who have made all of the chances, and that it what they did tonight.
“I thought perhaps the goal was offside but look it does not matter what we think. The same thing happed against Fingal when the ball went out for a throw-in but a corner kick was awarded and they scored from that corner.”
That said, “We had enough chances to finish the game off ourselves tonight,” he acknowledged. “We had options to get the ball out wide on a number of occasions but we did not take those options and we will work on that during the coming week.
“No-one can blame my players however because all of them worked very hard tonight and I cannot remember Michael Devine having one save to make all through the game… We will have to take our chances, especially against top teams like Shelbourne. That is twice we have switched off this season and on both occasions we have been made to pay.
“A lot of the other teams in this league will not punish us in the same manner but nevertheless it is something we will have to get out of our game, and we will. We need to get points on the board from here on in, starting with Athlone next week.
“We have the players to do that and make a good challenge to win the league. There are players in this squad who can score goals. Remember this was our first defeat. I have told them to take that bad feeling in and then spit it out and go on to win football matches.
“We are still gelling together and we will give this league a right go. I have put that pressure on myself and I believe when we all get to know each others play we will kick on big time,” concluded the Blues manager.
