Wolves are out of the FA Cup after losing to Coventry City – and Gary O’Neil insisted after the game anyone blaming the players for the result is ‘miles off in their opinion’.
Wolves lost 3-2 to the Championship side at Molineux in gut-wrenching fashion, with Ellis Sims and Hagi Wright scoring injury-time goals to send them to Wembley.
Wanderers got their noses in front after Rayan Ait-Nouri and Hugo Bueno had cancelled out Simms’ controversial opener.
But the hosts couldn’t hold on, and Coventry were able to dig deep.
Some Wolves fans are still feeling frustrated today about the result and naturally on social media, there is a desire to play the blame game. But O’Neil will not accept yesterday’s result was the fault of the players…
Bullish Gary O’Neil defends his Wolves players after Coventry defeat in the FA Cup
The loss to Coventry is going to sting for a while for some.
It was a great opportunity to get to Wembley again, for the first time in five years.
But Wolves just weren’t quite at it at Molineux, with Coventry having a plethora of chances in the game. Had it not been for the excellent Jose Sa being on top form, there would have been real daylight between the two teams.
Ultimately, Wolves struggled without key players.
With this in mind, O’Neil was keen to exonerate those who featured yesterday, saying (as quoted by the club’s official website): “We’ve felt it for a while. No excuses – we know the situation. Coventry today were the better side. We have to take that, to accept it. I can’t criticise the players that we had available, they gave absolutely everything.
“Today is just an accumulation of where the club has ended up. It is what it is. You can’t criticise the players and anyone who wants to blame the players for today is miles off in their opinion. The players gave everything. We have one senior attacker fit at a Premier League football club, which makes it tough.”
Wolves players gave all they could, but Wembley trip was right there…
O’Neil did his best after the game to protect his players and was more than happy to invite criticism onto himself.
That is admirable, but the players are not 100% blameless for the defeat.
Ultimately, Wolves went 2-1 up in the game and they had that semi-final trip to Wembley right in the palm of their hand. It’s not like the team struggled the whole game and had no chance.
But you can understand O’Neil moving to take the blame, and the players who played will probably be thankful to him for that.