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No excuses is Daniel Farke’s Norwich City mantra after Aston Villa reverse
Harrison Reed's turnover led to Aston Villa's opening goal. Picture: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd - Credit: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd
Daniel Farke labelled Norwich City’s first half surrender at Aston Villa ‘horrible’ - but the City chief insists it is too easy to hide behind a lengthy injury list.
Ivo Pinto was the latest casualty unfit for duty in the 4-2 Championship defeat at Villa Park, while Nelson Oliveira and Marley Watkins were carrying knocks that limited their involvement.
Farke is without Alex Pritchard and Jamal Lewis for months, Louis Thompson is an even longer term absentee and Timm Klose is yet to feature this season.
City’s German head coach, however, is not interested in excuses after ‘gifting’ the Villans an opening league win.
“Our passing quality was really horrible in the first half. We spoke a lot about how Villa is very aggressive and very good in counter actions.
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“The first four chances for them was a gift from us,” he said. “Then in addition there were some easy faults in our defensive behaviour. We deserved to be losing at half-time. Yes, I was angry with them. It was unnecessary to be so sloppy in the passing.
“Yes, perhaps the worst 45 minutes since I have been in charge. We had problems against Sunderland and we worked on those topics. This is a little setback.
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“We will improve. If you are better on the ball you are not under so much pressure defensively.
“It was clear for Villa this was an important game and they would have a big will to get their first win.
“We knew there would be pressure on us because the stadium was wanting this win. You have to be concentrated in your passing.”
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City’s testing start to the Championship has not caught Farke by surprise after the latest 4-2 loss in the midst of a congested early season schedule for his depleted squad.
“It is part of the change in football,” he said. “The game has developed. Maybe 20 years ago it was the starting line up each and every week, unless you had an injury or a suspension. The game is much quicker, the load higher and you need 17 or 18 who can play maybe 70pc or 80pc of the games. Then it is just which players are important for which game. It would be good to have training sessions on the pitch all together, but that is not possible at the moment.
“We knew Aston Vila would be aggressive and motivated. It was almost a do-or-die game for them so early in the season. We knew with having the third game in six days it would be a hard struggle but the reason we lost was we didn’t play well enough in the first half. We were very bad and Villa deserved to be in the lead at half-time.
