Millwall boss Alex Neil delivers intriguing verdict over red card decision in Portsmouth defeat
Pompey claimed a 3-1 triumph over Millwall to end their six-game winless run on Saturday afternoon.
Alex Neil believes Joe Bryan’s red card against Pompey was ‘very dubious’ after Millwall suffered a 3-1 defeat at Fratton Park.
And the Lions boss insisted his side didn’t do the ‘basics’ well enough to earn anything in what proved to be a frantic afternoon on the south coast.
After a number of Pompey protests, referee Michael Salisbury eventually brandished the red card to reduce the visitors to 10 men for the final 23 minutes.
Although Mihailo Ivanovic was able to pull a goal back soon after, the Blues were able to kill the game off, with Jordan Williams netting a wonderful third.
And while Neil has laid some of the blame on Bryan for the dismissal, the Millwall boss believes the sending off was ‘dubious’.
Alex Neil’s verdict on Millwall red card v Pompey
He told the Southwark News: ‘I think it’s very dubious whether it is a sending off, but Joe should not give them the opportunity to do that.
‘I think the reaction of the players, the reaction of the fans, it doesn’t surprise me that the referee went over and brandished a red card. I think Joe’s tried to get the ball because otherwise he’s running wide and he’s at the halfway line.
‘I think he delayed too long. He should have got across earlier. I was shouting at him from the side. I could see it happening, and he delayed and delayed and delayed. If you’re going to delay, you need to make sure you make clean contact with the ball.
‘I’ll have to look at it back, I haven’t seen it since. My instinct at the time is that it’s unlikely. But then the minute I saw all the players run around and the fans start screaming, I thought, ‘Yeah, he’s going to get sucked into that.’ And he did.’
Alex Neil’s disappointment after Pompey defeat
The 3-1 loss to the Blues extended the Lions’ winless run to four Championship matches as they begin to slip away from the play-offs.
And Neil has admitted his squad are feeling the full effects of their injury problems.
He added: ‘We certainly lack experience as a group at the moment. When you’ve got guys like Coops and (Ryan) Lenny and Billy (Mitchell) and all these boys missing, it’s naturally difficult for a lot of the other lads to come in and do it on a regular basis.
‘You can manage to put them in here and there and get them some game time, which is good. That’s not the reason for the defeat.
‘I think as a group we should have retained the ball better. We didn’t, and then what happens is you end up having to press all the time. Then, when that happens, you’re tired when you get the ball back.
‘I didn’t think we dealt with first balls up either. There’s one at the end, the lad punts it, and they end up getting a corner, we don’t deal with the first header. They’re just basics for us that we are normally very good at.’