Maguire: We have to take our chances
TranscriptCaptain Harry Maguire was frustrated after the Reds were held to a draw at The Hawthorns…
Harry, if I just take you to the last moment of the game: Did you think you'd won it there? Obviously I snuck in the box and timed myself with a great header, and it's a fantastic save to be fair to Sam. I haven't seen it back but they're the moment, at the moment, that aren't going for us. For sure we need to improve, we need to do better. We need to not be waiting until the last kick of the game to create big chances, but we dominated the half, we dominated the game, and we know that we're not going to come here and create nine, 10 chances – that doesn't happen. You need to get the first goal and then things open up, and the first goal is crucial. But yeah, we huffed and puffed in the second half and we’ve got to do more, but we dominated the game. We’ve got to take our chances; we’ve got to win the game. Is it a frustration to concede first, to concede early? We’ve obviously done it quite a lot away from home in the Premier League. Is that a frustration? Of course it is. It’s a big frustration. We know the first goal is crucial when you come to this place. But it’s a foul. I’m fed up of hearing ‘Vic can do better’. Of course he can do better, and I know he can. But I’m fed up of hearing ‘people can do better’. ‘David can do better on the cross’. It’s a foul. It’s a foul from Billy Sharp on David. If you get someone in the back, and if the big striker’s wrestling Vic and then puts his arms all over him, heads it in the back of the net, of course he can do better, but it’s a foul. So when are we going to get these decisions? As defenders and goalkeepers, you expect a fair decision. For me, I know Vic will be disappointed in there, and I’m sure he’s probably getting criticism, he knows he can do better. But it’s a foul, so we shouldn’t even be speaking about this. He’s a big striker who’s bigger than Vic and he’s wrestling him, he’s got his arms all about it, and he heads the ball in the back of the net. I had one disallowed at Burnley two or three weeks ago, and the difference is massive. You can’t tell me that I did more than the striker’s done there! So the inconsistency is something that we need to look at. But for sure, it’s a foul, and I’m not making up excuses, because Vic’s disappointed in there and he was disappointed at half-time. But he’s reacted really well in the game. I’m sure he’ll feel it was a mistake, but like I say, I’m fed up of hearing about mistakes from defenders and goalkeepers when it’s a blatant foul. When Bruno scores right at the end of the half, did you think you’d then go on to win it, scoring at such a late time at the end of the first half? It was a big goal for us. A great goal from Bruno. We were getting a lot of joy down the left-hand side. They closed it up a bit in the left-hand side in the second half, so we got a bit more joy down the right. But yeah, it was a great time to score. We had energy in the dressing room. It felt like if we didn’t concede again we’d win the game. We created chances, we had a lot of attempts in the box, we’ve dominated the half. I think they’ve had one chance at the end which was obviously a good chance when we’re trying to open it up, because a draw is no good for us – we wanted three points. We thought we had momentum at half-time, for sure, but it happened against Sheffield United as well. So it’s something we need to work on, something that we need to improve on. Because we got back into the game at West Brom and then at home to Sheffield United we ended up losing. We’ve not managed to kick on here today, even though the second half I felt like we dominated the game. We played at a good tempo, we just needed something to fall for us or a decision to go our way.