Abbott Disappointed by First Half Showing

Hinckley AFC manager Carl Abbott was disappointed with his side’s first half showing in the 1-0 defeat to Bolehall Swifts in the Les James Challenge Cup on Saturday.

Alex Morris’ own goal was the only goal of the game ten minutes before half time, and Abbott felt that his side lacked energy before the interval. Speaking after the game, he said: ‘We’ve given the lads a bit of a toasting at half time. I don’t know why it was so flat, or why it looked empty and abject.

‘We’ve made a slight formation change today, playing with two sitting midfielders to accommodate Robbie Millington in the pocket and our wingers slightly more withdrawn. I don’t know if that’s the reason, but we’ve sat off them a little bit. But with the personnel out, we’ve been forced into that change of shape.

‘The lads were flat, and we’ve given away a goal of our own making for the umpteenth time. We’ve contested a game of football for 45 minutes, and that’s not good enough at all.

‘It’s disappointing today, in a competition that I wanted us to do well in, that we’ve been flat for 45 minutes. It’s taken another half time like at Racing Club Warwick to play how we did in the second half. If we play like that for 90 minutes, and don’t give a goal away, then the opposition don’t lay a glove on us.’

Robbie Millington and Matt Gardner both made their Hinckley debuts in the match. Millington partnered Mark Bellingham up front, and Gardner made his appearance from the substitute’s bench, and came close to scoring late on when his low effort struck the base of the post.

‘Robbie Millington is a really good player, he’ll be a great signing for us. Where he ends up playing in our favoured system, when Nathan Walker returns, we’ll solve that one, but he can play through the middle, as a wide forward or off the front.

‘Marco (Adaggio) is seeing a specialist on Wednesday. Worst case scenario, we don’t see him for the rest of the season if he has an operation. Best case scenario is that he might be training on Thursday, so we’ll just have to wait and see.

‘Robbie could link up quite well with Marco, and we’ve still got Tyrone Clarke-O’Connell to come back in a week or so as well.

‘Gards (Matt Gardner) is a real poacher, a goalscorer. He’s had one chance today, where he turned on the swivel and hit the post. Matty Gardner will score goals, he’s a bit like Bello (Mark Bellingham), so they are two good additions.’

Hinckley will have an immediate chance for revenge on Tuesday when the two sides meet in the league, and Abbott said that lessons can be learnt and taken into Tuesday’s match.

‘Tuesday can’t come quickly enough. If my hand was forced into one of the game, I’d would take the league game, but make no mistake, I held nothing back today, I wanted a run in the cup. There’s a few different things that we can bring to the game on Tuesday, and we’ll see where we go.’