- Details
-
Created on Monday, 04 April 2022 12:28
-
Last Updated on Monday, 04 April 2022 22:30
-
Published on Monday, 04 April 2022 12:28
-
Written by KEVIN MARRIOTT Cornwall football's touchline ace
On the day when they welcomed back prolific top scorer Rikki Shepherd after a three month absence through injury, Millbrook were unable to carve out any opportunities for him as they slipped to a disappointing defeat. It was clearly a boost for Millbrook supporters to see Shepherd’s name on the team sheet after his troubling groin strain, but even he can’t do much without chances. Goals either side of the half-time break by brothers Miles and Jake Quick deservedly secured all three points for Wellington. Miles broke the deadlock four minutes before the break by heading in Jake’s cross and six minutes into the second half Jake made it 2-0 at the end of a flowing move. Millbrook boss Macca Brown said: “Sometimes football is quite straightforward and you can reflect on a game and say quite simply the better team on the day won. “I have no complaints at the result, other than the first 15-20 minutes they showed far more quality than us in most aspects of the game. “We started well, and I was really optimistic that it was going to be a good day with some of our play, but Wellington settled into the game and really took control from that point onwards. “We gave the ball away too easily throughout, whether that’s sloppy passes or just in 1v1 moments and we couldn’t sustain possession, and you can’t get away with that at this level.
“The pitch was tight and ground was rock solid so it was a hard surface to play on but that’s not an excuse, other teams handle the ball and keep it so well and we didn’t do that and they did.
“I don’t think we were able to string three passes together but there are a lot of reasons for that, not just quality. “We rolled every dice, switched things up at half-time and made some early changes to personnel but on a whole they were just better than us.”
As Millbrook look ahead to Saturday’s home game against Ashton and Backwell United, Brown said: “I’m honest enough to admit that it’s a really frustrating time at the moment. We’ve had some good results but it’s still been difficult since the start of 2022.
“We were flying before Christmas and since then have been robbed of some of our key players with injury and we don’t have a squad that can handle that so we are going to get games like we’ve had in the last seven days.
“We’ve given young players a chance and other players have had to move position to plug gaps so we effectively lose their strengths as well, and while they’ve all been brilliant it’s naturally going to impact the flow of the side as you end up a long way away from full strength and thats where this league is unforgiving.
“We have tried adapting things to find an alternative threat and be more on the front foot in games and the result of that has been conceding five goals and not really creating a chance in the last two games so as manager I can see that I’ve not got it right there and maybe that’s disrupted the team a bit too.
“So next weekend hopefully we can welcome back Jason Richards, Sean Thompson, and Dave Youlden, who have missed the last few weeks.
“Positives on Saturday were that Jake Foster got more minutes on his return from injury and Rikki got his first action in nearly three months and hopefully there were no setbacks there so we’ll be in a stronger place.
“There’s no time to feel sorry for ourselves, it’s a bad week but we’ve been there before this season and every game presents a new opportunity.”