Soccer
It was harder than I expected – Matthias Jaissle proud to see Newcastle progress
Newcastle head coach Matthias Jaissle admitted his side’s Carabao Cup third-round tie at Millwall was “harder than expected” after they scraped to a 1-0 victory past the Sky Bet Championship side.
After being unable to make their first-half dominance count, the Magpies were drawn into a battle at the Den as the Lions sensed an opportunity to cause an upset, despite being without 11 injured players.
Just after the hosts had come within a whisker of going ahead, the Premier League outfit, who named a strong line-up, finally settled the tie through Joe Willock’s 81st-minute winner.
Jaissle said: “It was harder than I expected, but I’m proud of how the lads were dealing with the challenge and how the lads also improved, especially compared to the first half against Bournemouth, when it comes to the physical level and the fundamentals of the game.
“Therefore, I am really pleased and I think we deserve to be in round four.
“We were dominating the game in general, but there were also elements missing when we talk about the final pass and when we talk about the final shot.
“But there was also an opponent on the pitch who did everything to keep the clean sheet, so sometimes it takes a little bit longer to open up a game.
“We did it in the end and it was enough to make it a round further.
“There’s potential to improve, that is also clear, but that is normal in football, especially at such an early stage.”
Millwall came close to breaking through after 79 minutes when Tairyk Arconte got away from Tino Livramento and his shot struck the near post.
Two minutes later, Newcastle snatched victory when Lewis Hall’s ball across the six-yard box was flicked in by Willock, via a slight deflection off Lions captain Jake Cooper.
Millwall boss Alex Neil said: “I thought it was a really good performance from us.
“Obviously, when you look at the two teams, they made three changes, we made more.
“Everybody who’s connected with Millwall knows we’re going through a bit of an injury scenario right now where we’ve got a lot of players missing.
“To more than hold their own in the game against a Premier League team who have been very good this season – I think they’ve scored at least two in every game that they’ve played.
“I thought we limited them to very little in the game in general, and what you’re hoping for in these types of matches is that the opportunities you do have come first.
“I thought our opportunity came first; Tairyk burst through, he’s one-on-one with the goalkeeper, hits the post, it comes back and hits his leg just when it looked as though it may have gone back in.”
