Burscough joint-manager Craig Davies spotted positives in his side’s display but insists players can’t ‘roll over and die’ as they suffered a crushing defeat to AFC Liverpool.
It was the first home match in charge and one to forget for the new management at the Linnets.
A slow-start and a second-half capitulation contributed to the 6-1 defeat but Burscough showed glimpses of quality.
They also had chances of their own with Robert Oseh and Junior Dos Santos rattling the woodwork. Edward Servuts was also denied on a number of occasions.
Following on from their 1-0 defeat to Silsden in the FA Cup at the weekend, it was an unhappy debut in the home dugout.
For Davies, he saw it as a ‘harsh awakening’, he told Off The Park: “Welcome to this league for some of us.
“Obviously it’s still early days but I seen a load of good things first-half even though we went one behind pretty early. The set-piece for the second one is just poor communication, we haven’t gone out and doubled up to make it two-v-two.
“For the best part of the first-half we caused them loads of problems, we didn’t have the final decision at the end to get us in the game,” he added. “It’s always an uphill battle, I know them well so I know what they’re capable of and what they can do to anyone so we’re always wary of that.
“Disappointing how it panned out because I felt we just stopped, one or two gave up and that’s now how me and Todd set teams up to roll over and die. Harsh awakening for the best part, loads of positives.”
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Elliot Hughes fired AFC Liverpool in front inside three minutes. However, despite their slow-start Burscough fired back and dominated the opening 45 but still found themselves two down through Kyle Schorah’s effort on the stroke of half-time.
Pinpointing where it went wrong for Burscough, Davies said: “For the first-half, they went two in front from nothing really because they’re experienced, they had blocks on that line, they had last-ditch tackles, they did everything they can to keep a clean sheet until we scored.
“We lacked that clinical edge, took an extra touch when we didn’t need to, shooting from 40-yards in the hope of shooting, Jack McGovern is a good goalkeeper so it’s going to take something special to beat. I think we needed more ideas behind how creative we could’ve been.
“But the tale was they took the chances and we didn’t.”
The scoreline suggests a heavier defeat than to what transpired, on the balance of play, inside the first 70 minutes. But it was damage limitation for Burscough after AFC Liverpool ran riot with three-goals in just six minutes.
Some of the attitude throughout the second half left Davies frustrated. He continued: “At half-time, you know the scoreline and the cliche at 2-0, you get the next one and it’s game on.
“But they got the next one and it was pretty much game over, we didn’t do what we set out to do. We changed it and the players changed it on the pitch and they didn’t need to, they were getting a bit of joy from it.
“But we have to be honest, we have to be truthful, we have young players who get in our team straight away but have never played 10, 20, 30 games at this level but it’s a rude awakening for some of them at this level.
“But we can’t accept lads jogging around and giving up, that’s not how we play and how set up our teams play.
“We got a lot of joy round the sides and then we weren’t clinical enough in the box, our cross was off, it was an extra touch when we could’ve shot, they got the blocks in, the signs are there,” Davies added, noting the positives from the display.
“Saturday was unfortunate, the signs are there tonight, spells of it but I think we have to be more savvy, more streetwise in terms of going gung-ho and leaving us exposed.
“Their lads just stayed up and broke us too easily. We’ve got be effective and a lot harder to beat, we can’t have lads roll over and die, they’ve got to lot more than they did in that performance.”
