Ibbo: 'We need to be more consistent'
STEVE Ibbitson wants his young Lewes team to show greater consistency for the entire 90 minutes.
The Rooks manager was delighted with the fight his players showed to come from 2-0 down to draw 2-2 with promotion-chasing Braintree on Saturday.
But it really was a game of two halves from Lewes' perspective as Joe Keehan's 45th minute goal was the only highlight of a poor first half.
The hosts built on the goal to put in a much improved second-half and Keehan's second of the match with four minutes to go earned Lewes a share of the spoils.
"It wasn't just 2-0 down, they had three excellent chances after that and we could have turned round 5-0 down at half-time and probably should have done," Ibbitson remarked.
"The first goal was a bit fortunate, the ball bobbling in the box. We'd said just before that to be in the game we needed to get one back to be in the game and shortly after that we got the goal, we didn't deserve it but we got it.
"We said to them at half-time we've got out of jail almost but we've got to compete. If we play like that again we're gonna get smashed.
"We've got a lot of young lads who don't think about their game as much as they should do. We try and get information onto them but we can't play their games for them and firstly they've got to compete better then they did first half but also if things are going wrong on the field they've got to work them (the opposition) out themselves.
"Often we've got to get them in the changing room, I'm not saying we're always right but there were things going on in the first half which were blatantly poor. We could see what they needed to do but they've got to work things out themselves.
"We've certainly got to play better then that for 90 minutes and if we can play like we did second-half we wouldn't be in the position we're in. We've got to find a bit more consistency."
Keehan's brace made it 11 goals for the season, six ahead of second highest David Wheeler and his continued goal threat from midfield could prove the key to keeping Lewes up.
Ibbitson said: "Joe took his goals well and David Wheeler almost pinched a similar one just before it (the winner). We were concerned he wasn't getting near enough their central midfield players and he was one of the ones we asked to step up to the plate and he did, he deserved his goal and played very well second half."
He continued: "Ross (Sutton) did very well. Ross has been defending very well from left back so it was a bit of a gamble moving Rossy wide left but he played very well, I thought he played well.
"I wouldn't like to say we deserved a draw because I thought we were so poor in the first half we didn't deserve anything out of the game, but all credit to the boys second-half the played very very well and battled hard and did all the things we asked them to do so I'm delighted with a point."
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Weather for Lewes
Friday 25 May 2012
Today
Sunny
Temperature: 12 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 23 mph
Wind direction: East
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 12 C to 22 C
Wind Speed: 20 mph
Wind direction: East
