Oldham caretaker boss Pete Wild left fuming after first defeat at Macclesfield

Posted Sunday, January 20, 2019 by PA

Pete Wild did not mince his words after watching his Oldham side fall to a 2-1 defeat at Macclesfield.

Latics had been handed the perfect start when they were awarded a penalty just 10 seconds into the match as Callum Lang’s shot was blocked by Miles Welch-Hayes’ hand, which Urko Vera converted.

But from that point on, the lowly Silkmen were in the ascendancy as Harry Smith drilled in a deserved equaliser from the edge of the box in first-half stoppage time and Scott Wilson chipped in the winner eight minutes after the restart.

Wild was unequivocal in his criticism after tasting defeat for the first time in his caretaker role.

“It was uncharacteristic, we were poor all over the park, too many people didn’t turn up,” he fumed.

“I don’t know if people thought we could just come here and just roll them over, but we just weren’t good enough all over the park.

“Maybe because we’ve done so well over the last few weeks people have got carried away with themselves.

“That’s slapped us back down to Earth today, it’s a real wake-up call for us and it shows we’ve got a lot of work to do, and if you don’t work hard enough and you get outmuscled you get what you deserve. We got that today.

“Let’s make no bones about it, we got bullied. Our bubble burst with an absolute bang today, didn’t it?”

Despite victory, which moves them to within one point of safety, Macclesfield manager Sol Campbell was adamant there is plenty of things to work on.

“We started really sloppily,” he said. “I wasn’t happy because we weren’t doing our jobs and first of all being defenders, they got in a number of times and we got caught cold.

“It was difficult, I was disappointed with our rhythm, we weren’t picking the pass.

“I’m really harping on about transferring what we do in training into the game so we can respond, enjoy it and believe in the philosophy of what we’re trying to do, we went away from that a bit.

“The guys responded well though, it was a difficult game but I want us to have games sewn up rather than fighting to the end.

“It was a great game to win, don’t get me wrong, but there was a lot I wasn’t happy with.

“All we can do is keep winning our games, we’ve got to be focused on building momentum now.”