Yeovil Town manager Billy Rowley praised his squad’s defensive organisation and teamwork following the 1-1 draw at Aldershot that saw the Glovers play with ten men for an hour after Loick Ayina’s first half red card.
Yeovil went ahead through Slavi Spasov after a good team move and looked in the mood following a run of two defeats. Yeovil were denied a late winner and penalty and Rowley expressed his disappointment with some of the officiating on the night.
Speaking to BBC Somerset’s Jack Killah, Rowley said: “It’s bitterly disappointing, especially as I’ve just heard – maybe shouldn’t say this, but it’s the truth – I’ve just heard whispers of, you know, a referee assessor in the stadium sort of saying, ‘well, you know, it was a penalty, and it was a foul on JD’. So we’ve had some really, really strange decisions against us tonight. But that is what it is, I hope they are swings and roundabouts. It seems like it’s not at the moment for us, but we hope that changes.
“Sometimes you win a game, and you feel like you’ve lost, for emotional reasons and quality reasons, but I feel the performance tonight and the connection with the supporters and the heart and the grit that we showed, it feels like a win. It feels like a win from an emotional standpoint and a progress standpoint. We’ve lost out on two points that we probably should have had. I think we defended incredibly well, even when obviously we went to ten men pretty early. I felt like the boys rolled up their sleeves, they stuck their chest out a little bit and I felt like it was just a proper team performance.
“So, I’ll say it again, sometimes you play great and you lose a game, and I’ll praise the lads for that, and sometimes we win and we’re not so great, and I’ll also talk about that as often as I can, but tonight, like I say, it feels like a win from a team bonding perspective but equally [I’m] really disappointed to not win the game.”
Pic C/o Andy Preston AP Photography
The Glovers combined brilliantly to open the scoring through Spasov and the manager praised several of his team for the build up in the goal, which started with a ball from Joe Gubbins: “[It was] brilliant from Gubbins. I thought he was superb tonight, and we spoke a little bit to him yesterday in training about opening up that pass. It’s a really wide pitch here, they defend in a back four. I felt like if we ran the slot between their full-back and centre-back, we could free up [Ryan] Jonesy quite often, which Archie does really well. Gubbo’s picked it out incredibly and I think it was Zain [with the] good run. I thought Zain was superb as well, and I’m really, really happy for Slavi to score. He’s the model pro. He’s such a good lad. I love watching him train, and we’ve not seen the best of him yet, so I’m really happy that he’s off the mark.”
The game turned in the 29th minute when Ayina followed up his loose touch with a high, rash tackle giving the referee little choice other than a red card.
Speaking on the Salford loanee’s sending off Rowley said: “Look, naturally, I can’t praise and speak highly enough of Loick as a lad. He’s such a good character in the changing room. All of the players absolutely love him. I’m naturally frustrated with him. He’s obviously kicking himself inside, but sometimes when you’ve sat on the bench for the last five weeks and you don’t get on, and you travel to Barrow and you don’t get on, you have so much built-up adrenaline, and you want to prove yourself, and – I haven’t seen the tackle, so I don’t know what that looks like – but I kind of feel for him in a sense, because he just obviously wants to impress and show what he’s about, and I love that aggression as well, like I want defenders that want to defend and defend for their team, so I’ve got no bad words to say about Loick on that. It’s obviously a frustrating one, but that is what it is.”
The Glovers could (should?) have won it late on following Michee Efete’s equaliser with James Daly penalised for a foul after assisting Luke McCormick and a cynical trip on Ryan Jones as he entered the penalty area. On those moments, Rowley said: “Well, again, I’ll have to watch these things back to give a clear view on it. My gut feeling and my emotional feeling, being Yeovil manager, I thought it was a penalty, and I’m hearing from the bench it was a penalty, and I’ve heard the referee assessor whisper that in the stand as well, so a bit early disappointed with that. We just can’t control that now, so we just move on from that.”
Following defeat at the weekend and the spirited draw, Yeovil head into Friday against Solihull Moors tired but buoyed by ‘incredible’ support.
“While I’m so annoyed with the ref, it sort of killed us and at least if you come out of this game with three points, it feels a little bit sweeter. We are fully aware that we have to play again on Friday.
“The boys are in a good spot. There’s going to be a few tired bodies out there, a few tired legs, and a few tired minds probably, but it’s going to be down to us as a staff now to recover properly. Solihull is going to be a really tough game. I think they’re really unlucky to be where they are, um, looking at a lot of the data and metrics in the league. For all the nerds out there, there is a stat called expected points, and if you base it on that, they should be in the playoffs. So, it’s going to be a really difficult fixture for us, and we’re going to have to recover properly and make sure we’re right for that game.
“I actually had goosebumps again at the end, and I can’t thank them enough for that. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, this is not going to be a linear process for us with signing 15 players. We’re going to have our ups and downs. We’ve got a lot of young players in that changing room that, you know, a fair amount of them have come from a level below this, if not two levels below this. I appreciate, we’re a big club, we want to win every match – we will come good. I was really happy with a lot of aspects of our performance tonight, and I can’t thank [the travelling supporters] enough,” Rowley added.