Paul Warne admitted Derby County didn’t have enough quality ‘in the big moments’ as they started the 2023/24 Sky Bet League One season with a 2-1 defeat at home to Wigan Athletic.
Charlie Wyke scored a brace as Wigan claimed all three points at Pride Park Stadium in the season's curtain-raiser.
Wyke scored in each half for the Latics, either side of defender Craig Forsyth's equaliser for Warne’s side early in the second half.
Warne spoke to RamsTV after the final whistle to offer his verdict on the result.
His overall thoughts on the game…
It is obviously disappointing to lose. The early-season optimism is easily killed off with a home defeat and we are not happy with the result. I am not pleased with some of the aspects of our play and today was a day where not enough of our best players were at their best.
We did OK early on, should’ve scored off a set play and had a few other chances. We gave a goal away and they should have scored another as well before half-time.
We stressed at half-time that we needed to move the ball a bit quicker and we managed to get level. It was one wing-back in Joe Ward crossing for another in Fozzy to score and at that point I thought we were going to kick on to go for the win. They hadn’t really been in our half much and another error ending up costing us.
We didn’t create a clear-cut chance in the latter stages and they made it hard for us, they had something to hold on to. We had 21 attempts overall but we either need to take our chances or create better chances. I think the lads’ energy to win sometimes spilled over a little bit; they’re so keen to do well and I can’t criticise their efforts. We just didn’t have enough quality in the big moments.
Games are reduced to being decided by fine margins and today was certainly one of those.
On the quality of the goals conceded…
No one intends to go out and make a mistake or concede a poor goal. If you do that against the better sides, they generally take them. On the whole, I thought we were two good and evenly matched teams. They probably didn’t make any mistakes to lead to a goal for us whereas we made two for them. We haven’t gifted them the win, but we contributed to it.
On the bigger picture…
It’s one defeat and it is disappointing because the lads have had a good pre-season. We’ve signed new players, but we’ve still got a few similar issues. We are still lacking a bit in some areas so hopefully we can do some more business in the market.
As I said earlier, I can’t knock the lads’ efforts and today just wasn’t our day. There are 46 games in the season and not every single one will go perfect.
We’ve got another game on Tuesday against Blackpool in the Carabao Cup and we go again. That’s all we can do.
