Portsmouth boss John Mousinho gives his verdict on the weak Cardiff City Championship defeat.
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00:00I'm disappointed we lost the game, I thought it was a poor performance overall. There were
00:05some really crucial moments I think that we got wrong particularly on the game and then
00:12gave ourselves a mountain to climb and I think if you give a side a two-goal lead, and we
00:16did give them a two-goal lead, I didn't think that Cardiff had to earn it. They earned it
00:20by being front-footed and they spanned the ball in the channel a couple of times. The
00:24first goal, ball gets spanned in the channel, throw in, we completely switch off from the
00:27throw-in, allow the cross into the box and put the ball into the back of our own net
00:31and that's a side that's unrecognisable I think from where we've seen the side at its
00:34best and then to concede from a set-piece, give yourselves an absolute mountain to climb,
00:38it becomes very, very difficult from then and I thought Cardiff got their tails up,
00:41they played some good football and could have had a couple more goals. You just can't go
00:47about trying to win football games like that.
00:50How frustrating was it at the start of the season, getting soft goals and getting away
00:54at the door?
00:55Infuriating really, we showed three clips in the dressing room at full-time. Number
01:00one was we win the ball back and rather than spinning it in the channel and making it difficult
01:05for a side like Cardiff, we've won 5-0 here at the weekend and quite clearly going to
01:10come here with a lot of confidence so we need to put them on the back foot and we need to
01:12make things difficult for them. We play backwards and we give away a free-kick, invite pressure,
01:16so we invited pressure upon ourselves. We did the same against Stoke where we didn't
01:19start the game well enough, we started the game flat-footed like we're still on the M4
01:23and that's too difficult. It's too difficult at this level against these sort of players
01:27to do that and it's worrying because of the mentality that the lads have shown to produce
01:34the highs of the weekend and produce the highs of Saturday and then to start the game as
01:38we did today. I've got absolutely no issue if we start games front-footed and for whatever
01:42reason Cardiff pick us off and score goals through individual brilliance because they've
01:45got really good players or we put a shift in for 70 minutes and we get tired because
01:49we've pressed all game and we've organised all game and we've not conceded from set-pieces
01:53and then Cardiff do something and put the ball in the back of the net. I've got no issue
01:56with that, I can live with that. I can't live without starting the game so sluggishly. That's
02:01not a physical issue, I think it's just one about mentality and that's something that
02:06has to be addressed. I obviously thought we'd addressed it because we spent a long time
02:12after the Stoke game in the build-up to the Oxford game and again those two weeks in the
02:15build-up to the QPR game we did see a very, very different side, a really good performance
02:19so to be able to slip back into that after two days is worrying.
02:23Is that what was said in the press conference, that it's quite a long and stiff duel in there after the game?
02:27Yeah, I thought the way we approached the game was just a bit apologetic to be honest
02:33and the corner to concede the goal is a really, really good example of that where we've got
02:39players that are capable of winning headers, we've got players that are capable of organising,
02:44of using the voices to make sure that we're on it and I just don't think we did that.
02:49I'm not entirely sure why that's the case, it's something we do have to come up with
02:54a solution to and yeah, that was why we did spend a long time. Usually I don't show anything
03:00after the game, usually it's a very, very quick debrief but I didn't think that tonight's
03:04performance warranted a quick debrief at all.
03:06Injuries 3-3, what's the situation today?
03:10Paddy Lane's done something to his achilles, Jordan Williams was injured in the challenge
03:13that with a free kick was given the other way somehow but yeah, took a nasty knock to
03:18the hip flexor and Nico, for the goal that we conceded from the corner I think he took
03:23a whack to the head and just had blurred vision coming off.
03:25You've only got three days now to pick yourself up, how do you do that?
03:31I think we have to be very, very honest about the performance tonight which we were in there
03:36I thought we did well to get away with 2-0 first of all and naturally players in those
03:45situations aren't the ones that speak but I think I'd like to try and get a bit of insight
03:51into their approach to the game and if there's anything that we did that wasn't quite good
03:56enough or anything that we did that allowed us to start as flat footed and as lethargically
04:01as we did and if there's anything we'll take it on board and try and change that because
04:06we need to go again.
04:07Thankfully we've got a game on Friday which is great news, it's brilliant news for us
04:11but one thing we can't do and it's completely unacceptable is keep saying we need a reaction.
04:18You can have that, we got that once this season, we got that once against Stoke and I think
04:22everyone gave us that.
04:24It is unacceptable to wait for something to happen to then react and that's the biggest
04:30problem I think we had tonight.