Despite a last-minute winner sealing all three points for Shamrock Rovers in a 3-2 defeat of Finn Harps, Hoops boss Stephen Bradley was disappointed with his side’s overall performance. Rovers had raced into an early two-goal lead, with David McAlli
Despite a last-minute winner sealing all three points for Shamrock Rovers in a 3-2 defeat of Finn Harps, Hoops boss Stephen Bradley was disappointed with his side’s overall performance.
Rovers had raced into an early two-goal lead, with David McAllister first, and Ronan Finn shortly after submitting their early goal-of-the-season contenders, but Bradley’s men looked a different team after the break, allowing Harps to draw level at 2-2.
“We were disappointed [in the dressing room],” Bradley said after the match. “We’re better than that. We shouldn’t need a last minute winner to go and win that game.
“You could see in the first half how good we were; we really could have been four or five ahead, without sounding disrespectful, it could have been.
“So to go from that to what we produced in the second half, it’s great to get the win in the end, but the lads weren’t happy with their performance in the second half.”
Bradley set his side up in a 3-5-2 formation, which he had done on occasion in 2016, but the Rovers boss feels his players this year are better suited to the system.
“I’ll use it a lot more,” he added. “I used it last year but I believe these players I have this year are more suited to play it. I think we have more mobility, more legs, and more energy about us, so we will use it a lot more going forward.”
Bradley continued to praise his wing-backs, saying what they offer is one of the key reasons for implementing the 3-5-2 system.
“With Trevor [Clarke] on one side and Simon [Madden] on the other it gives us that threat down both sides.
“We haven’t had that for a long time, it’s usually just Simon but now people are looking at Trevor and thinking ‘right, we’ll have to nullify that’.”
Next up for Bradley’s Hoops is a trip to United Park to face Drogheda United.
