Chris Agutter felt a point apiece was a fair reflection of the contest as Sutton United were held to a 1–1 draw by Brackley Town in a scrappy afternoon at Gander Green Lane.
Assessing the game as a whole, he was honest about the quality on show and the balance of play.
“It was scrappy. I don’t think it was a classic. On the balance of play, a 1–1 draw is probably about right. I don’t think either side did enough to really warrant putting three points on the board.”
“Overall, I think a draw is a fair result. Obviously, there’s frustration with the nature of the goal that we conceded, but equally we scored off the back of that type of approach as well. It’s swings and roundabouts.”
“We took the lead through a brilliant passage of play from back to front, and then we gave them a goal by being loose in an incredibly dangerous area.”
Reflecting on build-up play, the Head Coach felt the ideas were right, but the execution didn’t always match, with Sutton taking the lead through a well-worked move, though they were unable to maintain control thereafter.
“I need to watch it back, but I’m not sure the movement and the support for Simmo was quite clever enough at times. That’s why it broke down, rather than it being the wrong idea.”
“When you’ve got Naders up top and teams are that aggressive, it’s never a bad ball to stretch them and ask that question. We’ll look at that on Monday and just try to get better.”
He went on to say that playing out from the back remains a key principle, but one that requires the right decisions in the moment.
“It’s always a part of it. If the opposition are going to press, we’ve got to react to that. I don’t think we reacted well enough to the pressure or played the game that was in front of us.”
“We’ve scored more than enough goals and picked up more than enough points playing that way to suggest it’s a good idea. Sometimes it happens — you’ve just got to get better at it.”
“From about 25 minutes onwards, I thought we were really good. We mixed our game up well. When there was space to hit, we played into it and had success. When they dropped off, there were opportunities to play around or in between them.”
“We went through one-on-one and I’ll be disappointed we didn’t take it, but it was a brilliant bit of movement from David [Ogbonna] to get into that position. Overall though, I just don’t think we did enough to win the game.”
There were positives to take though, particularly from the new arrivals, with Jermaine Francis notching an assist, being named Man of the Match and completing 90 minutes on his first Sutton outing.
“I thought Jams [Francis] was excellent. Great energy, great enthusiasm, ran hard, and his work against the ball was really good. He played a key part in the goal with a very good assist.”
“It was a very good start for Jams, and Kwaku [Donkor] was solid as well.”
Furthermore, Ashley Nadesan’s first start since returning from injury was another bright spark, with the forward getting on the scoresheet for the first time since November, and the first time at home since the win over AFC Telford United in October.
“I thought he was man of the match. His link play was excellent, he was a goal threat, and he brought others into play really well. We knew he probably had an hour in him, but it was a really strong performance.”
Looking ahead, focus quickly turns to the next challenge and the opportunity to progress in cup competition.
“If we can finish the league season in a respectable position and win a trophy, that’s a solid start to our time here. You can’t turn your nose up at any opportunity to win a competition.”
“We want to keep shifting the mindset back to winning being the expectation and something that happens regularly.”
“Being at home today, it probably is two points dropped because we should win games on our own patch. We’ll prepare for the next game as diligently as every other one, with the aim of getting into a semi-final.”
