Andy Woodman has slammed Bromley for a “not good enough” performance in a 4-0 League One defeat against Leicester.
Will Alves opened the scoring in the fourth minute for the Foxes at the CopperJax Community Stadium, before John Lundstram doubled their lead 12 minutes later after he pounced on a loose ball as everyone else stopped following Luke Thomas’ trip following a minor clip from Marcus Ifill.
Thomas and Emil Riis Jakobsen sealed Leicester’s win either side of half time after the pair netted from assists by Sammy Braybrooke, with the latter having achieved a hat-trick of assists after he set up Alves’ opening goal, with the result having left Bromley sat second bottom in League One.
Woodman consequently was furious with his players in his post match interview with BFC TV as he blasted them for a lacklustre first-half performance, from decision-making to sloppy quality on the ball.
“I thought we were poor, of course, I can’t even say it any other way, I can’t dress it up. With respect to Leicester, I thought the goals we conceded and the goals we gifted them were just poor and out of the off.
“I just felt we were making bad decisions and our quality on the ball is not good enough. I’m putting the ball in the right areas, linking up the play, there’s so many things wrong to like that. It’s just blowing my brain to be honest because we work so hard in the week, we give all the information, and then they just deliver the gifts to Leicester.
“I mean Leicester must have thought it was their Christmas out there today.”
Woodman also was infuriated when asked whether his team could of attempted a comeback at 3-0 down, as he admitted that his side don’t look capable of a clean sheet.
“Is it possible? Impossible if you gonna keep giving the team the goals which I can’t fit anyone that scored an unbelievable goal past us, and that’s a problem, you know, and I keep saying it, the foundations in this football club have been built on clean sheets.
“We do not look like getting a clean sheet at all, and until we start doing the basics right, we’re gonna be in trouble.”
Woodman made four changes at half time but hinted that he could of made wholesale changes if not for the five substitutions limit rule, on top of fitness issues.
“Oh that’s what I can do. I can’t cut, my hands are tied a little bit what I can do, I mean I think we’ve got two fit centre halves in the building. It’s tough, you know, it’s tough. I’ve got players going down with cramp, I’ve got two left-backs who can’t get through 90 minutes, they can only play 60 or 50 minutes cos the risk of injury.
“I’ve got so many things up against, it’s unbelievable.”
Bromley showed a brief bit of spark early in the second half as Kamil Conteh fired wide but Woodman was dismissive of the brief improvement, as he believed that it was easy to make those small improvements at 3-0 down.
“It’s easy to play with a 3-0 down or 2-0 down, that’s, I always think that’s the easiest time to play football as stupid as that sounds. When it’s 0-0 and you’ve got to do the right things and you’ve got to be brave and you’ve got to put the ball in the right areas and then you’ve got to get hold of the ball and you’ve got to build momentum.
“That’s when you see what’s your team’s about. We’re 3-0 down. The opposition has took the foot to pedal the game over. That don’t count for nothing in my head.”
With a season-defining home clash against Peterborough on Saturday 24 October at 3pm as both teams fight for survival, Woodman brutally expressed belief that his team don’t seem to translate their high standards in training onto the pitch.
“Well I take that’s that team’s not good enough and the players out there, they’ve given their chance, you know, they’ve not been good enough. And again I say, you know, we can keep on that Leicester this 10 years ago, this five years ago less than this and that.
“It doesn’t matter who we’re playing, you know, we can be with respect we can be playing brain training and if we give goals away like that, there’ll beat us. And that is the problem at the moment and we are working and working and working and I just said to the lads, are we talking another language here?
“Because everything we do and everyone agree on you execute in the week, we game plan and everything we do and then you go out there and you just have a freeze. It’s too big an occasion or a trust. It’s just not good enough. And that’s a concern.
“You know, we cannot keep giving goals away and that’s as simple as this.”
With Peterborough only one point ahead of Woodman’s Ravens, the 55-year-old manager iterated that every match is massive for the club in their maiden season at League One level and has called for his players to go back to basics for that game.
“They’re all big games. I don’t think it’s a small game in this league for Bromley Football Club but I certainly haven’t looked at any game and think well that’s going to be a nice game for us.
“Not at all, they’re all massive games. And we have really just got to strip it back again and go back to the basics and try to execute the basics.
“You know because unless we start doing that we’re not going to keep a clean sheet.”
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