Kevin Nolan’s earlier comments about the referee seemed quite bitter, but in fairness, he did also say some nice things about the Imps that are worth picking up on.
The former Notts County boss admitted his side were second best and conceded that we made them pay for costly mistakes on a night when The Imps once again looked sharp, aggressive and relentless. 4-0 probably flattered them, not us.
While he did lash out at the referee, there was no attempt to sugar-coat matters from the away dugout after the final whistle. While we will quite rightly focus on the intensity, movement and clinical edge shown by Skubala’s side, the opposition view was that they played their part in their own downfall.
“It was a tough night,” admitted Nolan. “They’re a really good side and they’ve done fantastically well this season, you can’t take that away from them. They all know their roles and responsibilities and they do it consistently and that’s why there are at the top end of the table.
“Fair play to them because we were outplayed by a better outfit tonight. It’s sometimes tough to take but you’ve got to take it and you’ve got to be honest about it and what we have to do is learn from it because that’s where we want to be.”
Nolan claimed his team did have some moments, although in our opinion, they felt few and far between. However, even when they did create, he admitted they just did exert any pressure at all.
“We had some moments and some chances but we made wrong decisions and we didn’t execute well enough. I didn’t think there was too much in the game but we just didn’t put them under any real pressure.
“I say all the time that I don’t want to talk about referees, I want to talk about my team and if we’re poor, we’re poor and I’ll take that on my shoulders. We have to get better, we know that, and that’s what I’ve said to the players in the dressing room.
“That simply wasn’t good enough. We gifted them two poor goals and even when we went down to 10 men, we do 10 against 11 in training and the 11 should never score as easily as Lincoln did tonight.
“It was poor but we have to dust ourselves off because we have a big week coming up with three home games.”
I’m not sure about his ‘not much in the game’ comments – we had 23 shots, 13 on target compared to their four, none on target. We even bossed possession, 53% to 47%, which is unlike us. Still, Nolan’s words will be taken as a quiet confirmation of the standards we are setting. The comment about 10 against 11 in training is particularly telling. In theory, the extra man should control territory and chances. In practice, that only happens if the side with 11 players moves the ball quickly, stretches space and keeps its focus. We did exactly that.
There is also a wider point here about mentality. We have spoken often this season about professionalism, about not allowing momentum to drift, about treating every game with the same intensity, whether it is top versus bottom or a local rivalry under the lights. That consistency is becoming one of the defining traits of this side.
The visitors may feel they handed us opportunities, but we were ruthless enough to accept them. That has not always been the case in previous campaigns. Now, when errors appear, they are punished. We’re in the zone right now, and Nolan is the second rival manager in a row to hold his hands up and say how good we are.
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