Wilshere not proud of his behaviour at Stevenage despite 'unacceptable' decisions
Town chief saw red during 2-1 Boro loss
Hatters boss Jack Wilshere admitted that he wasn’t proud of his behavior after being sent off during Luton’s 2-1 defeat at Stevenage last week, a match in which he felt two ‘unacceptable decisions’ went against his side.
Firstly, midway through the first period, referee Andrew Humphries failed to give a blatant foul when midfielder Liam Walsh was clearly pulled back by opponent Daniel Phillips inside his own half, an incident that saw almost everyone inside the stadium expect the whistle to be blown. When it wasn’t, and having allowed play to continue, attacker Dan Kemp picked up the loose ball, raced forward and was able to beat Josh Keeley from 22 yards to put his side in front.
With Luton’s players dismayed by the decision, Wilshere himself went one further, as his verbal onslaught to the official saw him shown a red card by the under-fire man in the middle, and have to watch the rest of the game from the changing rooms. It also means that he will now face a touchline ban when Bradford City are the visitors to Kenilworth Road tomorrow, as on having to watch the game from elsewhere, and on his reaction to the controversial incident, he said: “It’s something I’m not proud of.
"I apologised to the players and the staff at half time, and I was actually really proud of how they responded as it was difficult. I didn’t like my behaviour and it’s something I need to do better. Ultimately I apologise to the fans as well as I’m ultimately the leader of this club and this team. I need to be on the side and try to help the players, so it’s frustrating for me and something that I’m working on.
"How will it be different for me? I received three yellows last year and I did the same at Wimbledon away. Wimbledon away was probably the only game that wasn’t stressful for everyone, I think that was one of our best performances. Did I enjoy it? No, however, did I like seeing the game from where I was.
"We’ve been chatting all week as staff about how the bench will look, about roles and responsibilities, but also I’ve got amazing staff and amazing experience in Chris Powell and how many times has he stood on the sidelines and led a team? So apologies from me as I need to behave better than that, but proud of the team for how they responded. I’ve got a meeting with the safety officer (about where he’ll sit), so I’ll be somewhere, I'll be there.”
Trailing 1-0 with 20 minutes to go, Luton then conceded a second goal in which the ball hit a clearly offside Josh Magennis and rebounded over the line, only for the incident to be missed by the referee’s assistant and allowed to stand. Asked this afternoon if both he and the players need to learn to control their emotions better when the game is going on, Wilshere continued: “Not the squad, as I thought how they responded was excellent.
"Let me make one thing really, really clear, the decisions were unacceptable. The first goal is a foul, there’s no doubt and the second one is offside. I’ve been there on the pitch and that is a really, really hard thing to accept when you’re in a game, you’re fighting and competing and something like that happens. So from a player’s point of view, I thought they carried the right amount of emotion. Football needs emotion, you need that so I think they do. From my point of view, yes, I need to be better, but I think the players responded really well.”
Meanwhile, on just how tomorrow’s clash against the Bantams will work for him and his backroom staff, Wilshere added: “I’ll be connected to the bench to one of the coaches. I’ll be watching the game from a different position than they will, so I’ll be able to see more. I’ll be in constant communication in terms of how we’re going to manage that as a group of staff.
"It’s something we’ve been speaking about all week and how do we get the right amount of information, but also give the staff roles that suit them and play into their strengths. We’ll be ready for that. It’s not going to affect the players too much as, number one, they’ve experienced it before at Wimbledon, but, number two we’ve got great staff that can lead.”