James Collins felt his side deserved more as Wolves under-21s were defeated by Norwich City in the Premier League Cup.
Joe Duffy scored the only goal of the game in the first half, but the Old Gold controlled a large period of the 90 minutes at Aggborough and saw numerous chances in front of goal go begging. Head coach Collins has spoken on the performance, giving different players an opportunity to perform and handing Owen Farmer the armband for the night.
On the performance
“We beat Leicester 3-1 last week and I thought we were average. I thought tonight we could’ve had four or five goals.
“I thought we were excellent. I thought we dominated the game, they had a right go as well but we possibly could’ve won that 5-2 or 5-0.
“We want to win games of football, of course we do. I drove home from Leicester disappointed because I thought we performed poorly. I’ll drive home tonight pleased because I thought we performed well.
“You don’t want to keep performing well and losing, but we’ve had a good run of results lately so that isn’t really a concern at the moment.
“I was delighted with some of the performances from boys who haven’t played for a while. They kept going, drove the game, created chances, we hit the post a few times, missed two empty nets.
“You’re obviously disappointed to miss the chances but I’m delighted with the performance, delighted with the spirit from the most senior player. Jonny playing at the level he played at was terrific for our lads to see down to the boys that have come in who haven’t played for ages for us.”
On different players getting an opportunity
“It’s a development programme and we’ve done really well in the International Cup and look like we’ve got a chance of progressing in that.
“We’ve had a good run in the league and you have to finish in the top 16 in the league to get in the play-offs at the end of the season.
“I’m not saying we sacrificed tonight because I thought we played really well, but I have meetings with players at the start of the season and there are certain players who I said would get opportunities, a chance to play and a chance to perform.
“Maybe some haven’t had as much as they’d like and I thought tonight was a good chance to give them that.
“There was a mixture with Nathan (Fraser) and Jonny dropping down, it was still a strong enough group.
“It’s disappointing because you want to progress in every competition. It looks a long shot for us in this group at the moment.
“We should’ve beat Bournemouth at home and drew, we probably should’ve beat Norwich away and drew, we were poor against Charlton and deserved to get beat, but tonight I thought we deserved to win. We didn’t, so credit to Norwich who did and off they go.”
On Owen Farmer captaining the side
“I gave him the armband because the truth is I looked at the group and thought Jonny doesn’t want the armband and we’ve got some older senior players in the team that are probably ready to go out on loan and move on.
“We haven’t really got a natural leader in the group, like an old fashioned leader. I thought Owen works harder than anybody else, he’s on the training ground first every day, he shows a great attitude and when you select him or don’t select him, he shows the same attitude – that deserves rewarding at a certain time.
“When I gave it to him he had a big smile on his face and I thought it gave his performance a lift which is what I hoped it would do.
“Him and Owen (Hesketh) down the left were a real threat with Jonny supporting all game.”
On final reflections and Blackburn next week
“I look at last year and the group we had. We were very solid, but we struggled to create chances.
“This year, we’re probably a touch less solid but we create a lot of opportunities and we’ve had some decent goal scoring games, and today could’ve been another one.
“Maybe sometimes you have to sacrifice a little bit of the defending for attacking players and I think we’re doing that at the moment, but with a good balance.
“Hopefully if we perform like that against Blackburn we’ll have a good chance of winning the game.”
