Paul Warne admitted there was plenty for his side to work on after seeing Derby County fall to a 2-1 home defeat to Port Vale in Sky Bet League One on Saturday.
James Collins put Derby ahead in Warne's first home fixture in charge of the Rams.
However, the striker was sent off in an incident-filled second half as Vale hit back through an Ellis Harrison penalty and a James Wilson strike.
The defeat was only the Rams’ second of the season on home turf and Warne caught up with RamsTV to offer his verdict on the action-packed 90 minutes.
On the game…
We got off to the perfect start with a goal after five minutes, but the outcome is disappointing. I thought we had some really good passages of play in the first half and were very good on the counterattack. We could have gone two or three goals up to be honest and you need to take your chances when they come. Their penalty in the first half wasn’t one for me. The second half was obviously tough. The penalty was a penalty, it was handball. The sending off was a massive turning point. Collo and the centre-back were battling for the ball; I though Collo was trying to get on the end of it and their defender wasn’t looking at it. I think Collo’s frustration got the better of him. I don’t think he’s caught their lad, but he hit the ground. I can see why the Referee gave it. I can’t knock the lads’ efforts at all. Ultimately a lot of what could go wrong today, did go wrong and the second goal was avoidable. There were some good bits from today, but collectively we need to improve. Today wasn’t quite our day.
On the good bits…
I will watch the game back when I am a little less emotional; right now I have a lot of opinions of a lot of things. I need to have a sleep I think before watching it again. The last 20 minutes or so was like a school match; they attack, we attack. I’ll focus on the first 60 minutes, during which time we looked good but didn’t have as much control as I would have liked. We are here to help the lads and we’ll sit down and go over what we can help them with. We want to win games and go on a good run.
On James Collins…
The red card is a big disappointment. Losing the game isn’t great but losing him for three games is a massive blow. He took his goal well and he’s been excellent in training since we arrived. It’s a shame that one incident will ruin his next few weeks. That’s how football is, I am afraid.