Saturday 14 March 2015 19:47, UK
Mark Hughes conceded that his Stoke team simply were not good enough as they slumped to a 1-0 defeat away at West Brom.
The Potters headed into the match in high spirits having won their previous three games but failed to get up ahead of steam at any point during the 90 minutes.
Hughes was at a loss to explain such a lacklustre showing from his side, particularly having had plenty of time to recharge their batteries since their last outing.
“We weren’t good enough today, from start to finish to be perfectly honest,” he said. “We started really slowly and didn’t come to terms with the opening period of the game.
“We needed to be a lot more on the front foot, we weren’t and as a consequence we let a cross into the box, didn’t defend it correctly and conceded.
“Obviously we talked about the importance of not conceding the first goal today and unfortunately we did. From that point onwards we found it difficult to really have any impact on the game.
“That’s not like us, we’re a good side when everyone is functioning and everyone is putting a performance. Today we had to carry too many unfortunately.”
“Leading into the game we’re doing the correct things and we’re all positive, we’d had a little bit of time since our last game to recoup and refresh and we were looking forward to it. But unfortunately today we just didn’t put in anything like the performance we needed.”
The Stoke boss admitted that his team had given West Brom a relatively simple afternoon as they struggled to carve out any meaningful chances.
“In the end West Brom were comfortable winners, they didn’t create too many open opportunities but they took one of them from which we were disappointed with our level of defending to allow them the opportunity,” Hughes added.
“They took it and comfortably defended that lead. We weren’t good enough on the day and that’s the top and bottom of it really.
“We needed to gain some momentum in the game and try and sustain that and we fired up a little bit, we had a little bit of a response but we didn’t maintain it and as I say West Brom were comfortable, we were never able to put them under too much pressure.
“We’ve been on a great run and the key now is to start another one. Today was a poor performance and we’ll hold our hands up in that regard and we’ll move on to the next one and make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Hughes also confirmed that Jonathan Walters was taken off as a result of what the club fear may be a broken cheek bone. The Ireland international will undergo tests to confirm the injury.
