Abbo on Bromsgrove Defeat
Hinckley AFC Manager Carl Abbott gave an upfront and honest post match interview following his side’s 2-1 defeat to Bromsgrove Sporting at The Victoria Ground today.
Two goals from substitute Kyle Turner overturned the returning Javia Roberts’ first half opener for Hinckley to move Bromsgrove ten points ahead of AFC in the league table.
After the game Abbo opened up about why Jean Kalenda didn’t re-appear after half time, and felt Bromsgrove used the conditions better than Hinckley when they were in their favour.
He said: ‘It’s been a difficult team talk because there are some things that have gone on today that people won’t be aware of.
‘I’m not going to make any secret of it and I think the lads need people to understand what’s happened at half time today and why we’ve come out not (looking like) ourselves.
‘I don’t know why Jean Kalenda’s come in at half time, took his strip off and said “I’m not going back out, I don’t want to play.”
‘He told us about a minute before we were about to go out for the second half so we’ve gone out having made a substitution with about 30 seconds notice.
‘Young Oli (Basham) has gone in without even warming up and the guys are scratching their heads wondering what’s going on, so there’s complete confusion reigning.
‘That boy will never, never, never play for this football club again and he’ll never play for me again. It’s disgusting, I’m angry and I don’t quite know what else to say really.
I’ve never seen or experienced anything quite like that in football in my life and I’m not one to air my dirty laundry in public or talk about what’s gone on in the dressing room publicly.
‘But I feel we need to be quite open about this because those eleven guys have had to come out in the second half and pick the pieces up.
‘That’s not to say Bromsgrove didn’t do a great job on us. They put us under loads of pressure with the wind and we couldn’t get out. Every dog has his day and we’ve been beaten today. I’ll take that on the chin, that’s football.’
Abbo also felt that his side didn’t make the most of the conditions when they were in his side’s favour in the first half, and as a result they were punished when roles were reserved after the break.
‘They were massive (factor in the game). I did think, having played against a heavy wind a couple of times in the last few weeks that we’d perhaps do alright second half and that it might even suit us.
‘But we didn’t get the ball down and play. I don’t know how much of that was down to what went on at half time but the lads have just not got settled back into the game. We’ve settled with about fifteen minutes to go but it was too little too late.’
