North-East Sport
Pardew accepts blame for Wigan thumping
10:29am Tuesday 1st May 2012
ALAN Pardew has claimed responsibility for the “tactical and psychological shortcomings” that contributed to Newcastle’s DW Stadium disaster on Saturday, and insisted there is a shared determination to put things right at Chelsea.
However, the Magpies will travel to Stamford Bridge without their only specialist right-back as Danny Simpson has an ankle injury that is likely to keep him out of tomorrow’s top-six showdown.
Pardew was deeply unhappy with Saturday’s first-half failure against Wigan, and the Magpies manager is understood to have spelled out his disappointment to his players in the wake of the game.
He spent yesterday morning gathering a raft of information on what went wrong and arranged an impromptu team meeting to spell out his squad’s responsibilities in the final three games of the season.
There is concern that the psychological mindset was wrong at Wigan, and rather than building his players up into Champions League challengers, Pardew appears keen to underline the traits of hard work and commitment that took Newcastle to the brink of the top four in the first place.
The Magpies manager has also accepted his tactics were wrong at the weekend, and there is likely to be a move away from the 4-3-3 formation that has been adopted in recent weeks when Newcastle line up in London tomorrow.
“I think the most important part for our fans in particular is a restoring of pride, and we have to do that via the performance on Wednesday night,”
said Pardew. “Tactically, we made mistakes as a coaching team (at Wigan).
“I think the psychology didn’t work for us and, with no disrespect to Wigan, the performance they put in was probably above themselves.
All those combinations resulted in that result, and we all take responsibility for it.
“I think part of the psychology was that, with all due respect to Wigan, it was them we were playing and not Chelsea that was three days around the corner. I’m not attributing any kind of blame here, I’m just saying that collectively we all got it wrong.
“The psychology of the team and the tactical side of things is my responsibility, and I felt that I let the club down a little bit as well. On Wednesday, I have to make sure I don’t get that wrong.”
Newcastle went in to Saturday’s game on the back of a sixgame winning run, a sequence that had pundits and supporters alike purring about the quality of their football.