Doncaster pay price for not killing off Bradford – boss Grant McCann

Posted Wednesday, March 06, 2024 by PA

Grant McCann admitted that Doncaster paid the price for not killing off Bradford after Tuesday night’s Yorkshire derby finished in a 1-1 League Two draw at Valley Parade.

Substitute Tyler Smith scored a late equaliser for the home side after Luke Molyneux’s fifth goal of the season had put Rovers on course for victory.

Doncaster manager McCann said: “I’m really disappointed we’ve drawn the game. I thought we were outstanding in the first half.

“We need to get to that point when we’ve got teams on the ropes that we need to kill them off and we will do.

“We passed around them and exploited the angles and were very good on a shocking pitch. But this pitch was better than Walsall’s pitch on Saturday – it’s a little bit flatter.

“We knew there would be a reaction from (Bradford boss) Graham (Alexander) and his team. They are combative but we had some good opportunities and had chances to score in the second half.

“Any other time you come to Bradford and it’s a decent point but I’m disappointed because of the way we played.

“The team is performing to a really good level at the moment. We just didn’t kill the game off.

“You need to get a point where you can go again and score again. We will get to that point.”

Bradford were playing their first league game for 17 days after consecutive postponements.

They looked rusty and trailed when Harrison Biggins played Molyneux through to score on the stroke of half-time.

But Smith converted a cross from fellow substitute Harry Chapman to earn a point, five minutes from time.

Bradford manager Graham Alexander said: “Not playing for a couple of weeks could have been a potential problem but I don’t want us to take the easy option by blaming that.

“We train at a high intensity and know what’s expected of us when we go into games.

“It was a poor first half. We weren’t good at any level and we can’t afford to repeat that.

“We were just hoping to get to half-time to make a change to the mentality but unfortunately conceded a really poor goal. We gave ourselves a bit of a hole to get out of.

“We’ve been really good defensively for a long time but it was poor from our perspective.

“It’s hard for me to have a go at the team defensively because they’ve been superb. Even tonight, I don’t think Doncaster caused us a load of problems.

“But the response was good from the players. We still probably didn’t create the amount of chances that we needed to win the game but I think we certainly deserved the equaliser.

“It was a fantastic goal from Tyler. I think the point was a fair result but we obviously wanted more.”