Kieran McKenna and Karl Robinson admit Oxford-Ipswich should have been stopped

Posted Sunday, January 22, 2023 by PA

Both managers questioned whether the Oxford’s 2-1 victory over Ipswich should have been played to the finish as fog thickened in the second half to the point where visibility was poor.

Cameron Brannagan emerged from the gloom to fire home from 25 yards in the 83rd minute to give the U’s revenge for their 3-0 defeat at Portman Road on Boxing Day.

The result was a blow to Ipswich’s hopes of automatic promotion, leaving them further adrift of top two Plymouth and Sheffield Wednesday.

Referee Robert Madden called the teams together twice in the second half to talk about the conditions, and in the 75th minute he told the managers that the 1-1 scoreline at the time would have to stand if it was abandoned then.

Ipswich boss Kieran McKenna said: “I’m disappointed and angry about how the day panned out.

“There’s not much we can say now to change it.

“We’re very disappointed to have lost – so many factors in it in terms of conditions, chances and things that didn’t go our way.

“But at the end of the day we didn’t do enough because we’ve missed the chances we’ve had and they’ve scored a 25-yard bouncing volley to win it with one of their only shots on target to win the game.

“It’s right to be angry sometimes when you drop points you don’t want to drop, and you’re in a run of results you’re not happy with.

“For Oxford’s first goal we weren’t strong enough, it was too easy.

“At the end of the game it wasn’t right to be playing in my opinion.

“We couldn’t see the ball, we couldn’t see the sidelines, the players were saying they couldn’t see the ball on the pitch.

“At that stage the game was a little bit ridiculous.”

Yanic Wildschut had put Oxford in front after 34 minutes, with Leif Davis levelling four minutes later for Ipswich with his first professional goal.

Oxford boss Karl Robinson said: “I thought our players’ attention to detail out of possession and tactically as well we were excellent.

“The two goals were moments of magic.

“We still feel frustrated at where we are in the table and there’s so much more to come from this team.

“But today I couldn’t be more proud of them. There were some real big performers out there, and for large parts of the game today we looked a very good side.

“We’ve got some big teams still to come here so they will be big games that will test us and our fans.

“If we’re being totally honest the game probably should have been called off but had it been we would have had a point.

“Once they realised that if the game was called off the result would stand and that might then not be good enough for them to get in the top two, they wanted to carry on.

“From my point of view it was maybe the wrong decision that ended up being the right decision.

“I couldn’t see much at the end apart from the electronic scoreboard saying 2-1!

“For me that was an outstanding win and really puts us in a good position moving forward.”