Dickov: We couldn’t keep up hot pace

PAUL DICKOV

ATHLETIC manager Paul Dickov admitted it was beyond his men to replicate their stunning effort in the opening third of the FA Cup defeat at Liverpool.

On top from the off, Athletic came close to forging ahead through efforts at goal from Shefki Kuqi, Tom Adeyemi and Chris Taylor, before Robbie Simpson’s cracker found the net after 28 minutes.

A strong argument can be made that no other top Premier League side would have fielded as strong a line-up against an npower League One club as Liverpool boss Kenny Dalglish did.

Class told in the end, though it took a deflected goal from Dickov’s ex-Blackburn Rovers team-mate Craig Bellamy and a disputed penalty converted by Steven Gerrard to edge the hosts ahead.

“I wanted us to continue it for 90-odd minutes, that is just how I am,” said a proud Dickov.

“But coming to Anfield, with the players they have got on a big pitch, they make you work hard.

“When you give them the ball back, they keep it.

“But for the first 25 to 30 minutes, we were fantastic. We were the better team, made the better chances and scored our goal.

“Soon after that there is a deflection for their goal which hurt us, then we lost our heads before coming back again.

“I know by my players’ reactions and their honesty whether it was a penalty or not and they were really angry about it.

“But they picked themselves up before the third, which did kill us.

“You have to go for it in cup games and we didn’t deserve the fourth and fifth.

“I talked about Mr Dalglish being my hero. And the first thing he said to me was, ‘that was never a 5-1’. I will take that.”