Newry City boss Barry Gray: ‘​​​​​​The team has got so much support this year that they don't deserve’

Following a humiliating defeat at the hands of Glentoran, the Newry Reporter interviewed Newry City manager Barry Gray.

Gray unloaded on his players, saying that he would have walked out at half-time if he was a supporter.

He also stated they didn’t follow the gameplan and that he has heard a lot of talking from the players in recent weeks, but hasn’t seen it in action on the pitch.

​We have transcribed the interview in full below:

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On Tuesday night, rightfully we praised the defensive performance. But today was a bit of a disaster. What, in your opinion, went wrong?

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That's being polite – 'a bit of a disaster'.

Defensive displays when you come to The Oval require 11 players, today we didn't play with 11 players. Not in any way, shape or form in our display.

Rightly so, like you said, Tuesday night was a good showing from us, even though we didn't get the win that we wanted.

But today was a disaster, from start to finish.

We were poor, we didn't follow the instructions, we didn't follow the gameplan; individual players decided that they were going to do their own thing, and that's what happens when players take responsibility and don't follow the simple instructions – we get a drumming, the way we did.

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It was probably a case of momentum. Early doors it was a close contest, but when Glentoran got their second, then their third it just seemed like an avalanche was coming down on top of you, which you could never really pull yourselves out of?

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Listen, we have a gameplan that suggests what we should do when we go behind in the game.

We have a gameplan that suggests what we should do if we concede early.

We did concede early, we got back into the game, and at that point we should just reset ourselves and go back to the basics to what we have been asked to do.

The second goal – you could see that coming – and there is no stopping it, and by half-time the game was well and truly gone.

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What's the week going to look like going into the Coleraine game? Is this one where you will labour on the defensive issues to try and make sure that it doesn't happen again or is this the type of game you just try to forget about and move on?

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We go back to the basics of what we have been delivering over the last six weeks.

We haven't got the basics right yet, consistently. We have only seen huffs and puffs of it.

Until we can get the basics set in the team week in and week out, regardless of who is in the team, or who we are coming up against, we don't have the right to do anything else.

The beauty is, for me as manager and the staff – we won't feel sorry for ourselves. We have inflicted today's performance on ourselves, and we will take responsibility for that.

My question is whether the players will, because it is easy to talk, but we have seen players talk for the last six weeks, and I have seen players at Newry talk since the start of the season.

That talking hasn't got them anywhere.

The reality of it is, will we see more? Not just in the next game – the next game is just the next game – we have nine games to play. So, one game is no good to us. We need to see more in every single one of those games moving forward, or else we're going down. Simple.

I don't know if the players accept that is the case, or if they just want to sit inside and feel sorry for themselves, as if it is somebody else's doing.

It's not, it's purely our own doing.

So, want more, work harder, put your head down and concentrate on what it is that you're doing, and trust the people around you who have more experience, to guide you out to the other side.

If it's right, wrong or indifferent at the end of the season, then we can take it.

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Obviously, it was a tough watch for the supporters. Do you have a message for them?

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It's pathetic.

It's mad that they stayed the length of time that they did, because if it was me, I would have been out the gate at half-time, and I wouldn't have even thought twice about it.

That's the thing about Newry isn't it? The team has got so much support this year that they don't deserve.

The difference between me maybe, and different managers is that I'll call it as I see it.

The fans have been brilliant, but today they had absolutely nothing to look at, or look forward to whatsoever.

And yet, the same people will be back next Saturday when we host Coleraine.

That's brilliant, that's brilliant support from them, and we can't fault them.

If only we could get the same appetite from the players week-in and week-out that their supporters show in the stands, then we would be blessed.