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Steve McClaren on crowd reaction to Villa performance ‘You can’t satisfy everybody’

8 years ago
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Steve McClaren says that he was ‘a little surprised’ when some supporters booed at the end of the Aston Villa match.

The Newcastle boss says that ‘you are always going to get that in football’ and ‘you can’t satisfy everybody’.

McClaren pointed to the conditions, effort of the players and that United were going for a win in the final stages as reasons why the fans should have been more supportive in his opinion.

Another reason offered against the crowd reaction was the fact that Steve McClaren brought on a ‘wide player’ (Thauvin) for a ‘defensive player’ (Anita).

Whether you think it is right or wrong to ever boo the team/head coach, the fact it took 71 minutes of the match to go on the front foot surely points to where the supporters’ reaction came from, rather than any lack of effort by the team.

Playing at home against the worst team in the league, it would be little surprise if fans didn’t expect Newcastle to be set up in an attacking formation to try and overwhelm the opposition.

After the game McClaren has also admitted that he was happy to try and play to catch Villa on the break, rather than controlling play by dominating possession.

I have a feeling that any negativity at the end of Saturday’s match was more aimed at Steve McClaren’s tactics, team selection and formation, rather than the ‘efforts’ of his players on this occasion.

Steve McClaren:

“They (the fans) know when their team don’t try and don’t put the effort in and don’t show attitude and don’t want to win the game.

 “We were going forward at the end, we opened the game up, put a wide player on for a defensive player and wanted to win the game and went for the game…so I was a little surprised (at the full-time boos).

“But you know you are always going to get that in football and you can’t satisfy everybody.

“We have to overcome the emotional fragility of the crowd – I thought we did that to a large extent, as we did against Tottenham and in the previous two games.

“We are trying to convince them to fight and come through it and see what you can do and conditions were really poor to play good football, which is what we like to do, the players did well in it I thought.”

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