Darrell Clarke apologises to fans after ‘absymal’ Cheltenham performance

By Sports Desk November 04, 2023

Darrell Clarke launched an astonishing tirade at his Cheltenham players and apologised for their “woeful” performance in 5-1 loss at AFC Wimbledon.

Without a win in five Sky Bet League Two games, the Dons made light work of the League One strugglers to reach the FA Cup second round.

Town, who broke records by going 10 games without a league goal at the start of the season, reached new lows in a desperate Plough Lane display.

“It’s nowhere near good enough,” raged Clarke. “At least we are all in agreement in the changing rooms, that’s what it was.

“It’s a woeful, embarrassing performance. Apologies to the fans that came to watch that.

“I have to choose my words very carefully because I am very angry at the minute and I want to make sure I don’t chuck too many people under a bus.

“It’s nowhere near the standards that I will be taking this football club to and the players are under no illusions about what I thought about the performance, and the staff, and now it’s about a reaction.

“It was abysmal, all of it. Woeful. Defensively, we gave them a 2-0 start, we were absolutely miles off it individually and collectively.”

The Robins looked to have turned a corner under Clarke, appointed in late September, beating Carabao Cup quarter-finalists Port Vale and Cambridge in their last three games.

All of that positivity ebbed away as Ali Al Hamadi opened the scoring with a fine finish into the bottom left corner in the 23rd minute after Omar Bugiel’s pass.

Tilley netted his first during first-half stoppage time, touching past the advancing Luke Southwood after Connor Lemonheigh-Evans’ ball.

Tilley volleyed in the third from the edge of the box after 61 minutes before Josh Davison beat Southwood with a deflected effort to make it 4-0 four minutes later.

Lemonheigh-Evans then curled in the pick of the Dons’ goals from 20 yards in the 70th minute.

Rob Street grabbed a consolation before Aidan Keena’s penalty hit the post in the 85th minute to compound a miserable afternoon for the visitors.

AFC Wimbledon boss Johnnie Jackson said: “Great performance. A really good test for us against a team from a higher league.

“Really, really complete performance. We created an awful lot and shut them out for the most part so I have to be pleased with that.

“We could have scored double what we did. We scored five and could have had five more.

“Cheltenham struggled at the start of the season, but since Darrell (Clarke) has come in, they’ve had a real response. They’ve won two out of their last three and started scoring, looking like a good side.

“We weren’t thinking it’d be an easy one for us. They are a league above and they have had that bounce, so we had to be right on and we have to give ourselves credit because we’d have done that to a lot of teams today.”

Related items

  • Indonesia 0-4 Japan: Visitors stay unbeaten with rout Indonesia 0-4 Japan: Visitors stay unbeaten with rout

    Japan continued their unbeaten start to World Cup qualifying with a 4-0 victory over Indonesia on Friday.

    Two goals from the visitors in either half were enough to seal the three points and get them back to winning ways after a stalemate with Australia last time out.

    Ragnar Oratmangoen should have put Indonesia ahead, but he hesitated one-on-one with the goalkeeper, and Japan did not look back after that. They got a bit of fortune with their first goal, Justin Hubner deflecting a cross into his own net in the 35th minute.

    Takumi Minamino got their second just before the break, finishing off a pacy counter-attack by darting onto the end of Kaoru Mitoma’s cross to sweep it past Maarten Paes.

    While there was not much the goalkeeper could do with that one, he was at fault for the third as he gifted the ball to Hidemasa Morita, who coolly picked out the bottom corner just after the break.

    Yukinari Sugawara came off the bench to round off the scoring in the 69th minute. He raced down the right wing and instead of looking to his options, he rifled it in from a tight angle at the near post.

    Japan are up to 13 points after five games, sitting top of Group C, while Indonesia are bottom, still in search of their first win.

    Data Debrief: Clinically done

    For a team still chasing their first win, Japan are probably not high on the list of opponents they would want to face, and Indonesia were undone by their visitors.

    Hajime Moriyasu's side created 0.79 expected goals (xG) to Indonesia's 0.72, while they only had four more shots than their hosts (12 compared to eight).

    Japan took their chances, and though the win margin may look harsh, they were deserving of the three points, having dominated throughout the game.

  • Jamaica 0-1 United States: Pepi give visitors advantage in Nations League quarter-final Jamaica 0-1 United States: Pepi give visitors advantage in Nations League quarter-final

    Ricardo Pepi's first-half strike gave the United States a 1-0 advantage over Jamaica after the first leg of their Concacaf Nations League quarter-final.

    The hosts saw a penalty saved in the first half before their frustrations were compounded late on thanks to Mason Holgate's red card.

    The USA had the lead just five minutes in – having smothered a Jamaica attack at one end, the visitors caught them out with a pacy counter-attack, with Pepi sweeping it into the back of the net.

    Shortly after, Shamar Nicholson was brought down by Matt Turner when he tried to take it around him, but the goalkeeper made amends, diving low to his right to deny Demarai Gray from 12 yards.

    In the second half, Holgate was denied a tap-in by Yunus Musah before Turner scrambled to stop Leon Bailey's corner from nestling into the net as Jamaica searched for an equaliser.

    With 86 minutes on the clock, Holgate received a second yellow card in just over 10 minutes for dragging Brandon Vazquez back, meaning he will miss the return leg in Missouri on Monday.

    Data Debrief: Hitting the mark

    Pepi got the all-important goal on Thursday, and is the fourth player to score 12 goals for the USA before turning 22 years old, joining Landon Donovan, Jozy Altidore and Christian Pulisic.

    But it was perhaps Turner who actually had the most vital interventions; he has now saved three of the eight penalties he's faced for the USA, including two against Jamaica.

    Mauricio Pochettino also could not have asked for a better result from his first competitive game in charge of the Stars and Stripes as he became just the third full-time manager to win his first competitive away match, joining Bob Bradley (2008) and Steve Sampson (1996).

  • Real Madrid hit Twente for seven, five-star Wolfsburg also win big Real Madrid hit Twente for seven, five-star Wolfsburg also win big

    Real Madrid had six different goalscorers as they trounced Twente 7-0 in the Women's Champions League on Wednesday, while Wolfsburg beat Galatasaray 5-0.

    Signe Bruun opened the scoring three minutes into the Group B encounter at the Estadio Alfredo Di Stefano, then Maria Mendez's header gave Madrid a 2-0 half-time lead.

    Madrid, who had won one and lost one of their opening two games in the tournament, got a third through Naomie Feller five minutes into the second half, then Caroline Weir made it 4-0 with a brilliant free-kick.

    Mendez headed home her second of the encounter shortly after the hour mark, while Oihane Hernandez and Carla Camacho got on the scoresheet late on to complete the rout.

    The victory took Madrid second in the Group B standings ahead of Chelsea's trip to Celtic.

    Wolfsburg were also convincing victors in Group A, getting off the mark for this season's competition as Rebecka Blomqvist scored a hat-trick in their 5-0 thrashing of Galatasaray.

    The Bundesliga side – who failed to pick up a point or score a goal in their opening two matches – had a narrow 1-0 lead at half-time through Joelle Wedemeyer, before Blomqvist took centre-stage in the second period.

    She tapped home after Janina Minge struck the crossbar, then added her second goal in the 77th minute and her third six minutes into stoppage time.

    Vivien Endemann powered home a fifth for Wolfsburg one minute later, as they provisionally moved within three points of Lyon and Roma ahead of their meeting.

© 2024 SportsMaxTV All Rights Reserved.