Does Molby Have Point?

Jan Molby and Kenny Jackett are unlikely to be exchanging Christmas cards this year after the former Swans manager refused to shake the current incumbent’s hand after the final whistle yesterday with Kidderminster beaten 3-0 although it could have been substantially more.

Molby had been raging for an hour and a half about the Swans opening goal which he claimed stopped his side being the better team and obviously affected them so much that they offered little in the second half to resist wave after wave of Swansea attacks.

For those that have not seen the incident this is roughly what happened. Andy Robinson played a corner into the area from which Izzy Iriekpen and visiting keeper John Danby. Danby then clattered into one of his own defenders and stayed on the ground as another defender tried to break quickly with Swansea having so many men committed forward. Sadly for the defender the play broke down immediately and the ball was played back in by Andy Gurney to the head of Paul Connor who flicked it into an unguarded net much to the dismay of the Kidderminster players and Jan Molby who dropped his pie at what he had seen.

I can fully understand the reactions of Molby to the goal but with a whole incident lasting only around five or six seconds it all happened too quickly for the Swans to have played the ball out of play or even for that matter noticed that the keeper was lying on the floor injured. It also conveniently slips Molby’s mind that his own players decided that they would try and launch a counter attack but are too sh t to actually find one of their man with a pass.

Molby even claimed on the Kidderminster official web site that the referee took the easy option by giving the goal and saying it beggared belief that he did not blow his whistle. Would it still have beggared belief if they had have managed to break and scored at the other end? I suspect not.

Of course Molby wanted a result the same as Yeovil and Plymouth in the Carling Cup a few weeks back. This was an incident where Yeovil passed the ball back to the Plymouth keeper after a stoppage and the ball went into the back of the net. Yeovil were so embarrassed that they let Plymouth run unchallenged through their defence for the equaliser. This situation was different but I guess when that is to be your only chance of scoring it is natural that Molby’s team needs all the assistance that it can get.

Many claims have been made that the challenge resulted in a broken nose for Danby in their goal but surely this would have actually occurred when he clashed with Trundle on a 50/50 ball a minute before the interval? After all that was when the blood appeared on his shirt!

Molby of course forgets the fact that during the second half Swansea played their best 45 minutes under Kenny Jackett and only some good stops, the woodwork and some inaccurate finishing prevented the five or six goal hammering that the Swans deserved to hand out.

Speaking after the game, the two managers said “I thought the challenge was fair and when the ball came out Kidderminster had a chance to clear,” Jackett said.

“If they had broken away, would they have been happy for it to be pulled back? It’s the referee’s (Fred Graham) decision to stop the game, not mine.”

Kidderminster boss Jan Molby, a former manager at the Vetch, was left fuming at the decision.

“There were various ways to deal with that situation but the simplest thing you could do is just blow the whistle,” Molby said.

“The referee failed to do that, which beggars belief. If you ever see another goal like that again this season then I’ll feel very sorry for whoever has to put up with it.”

From our point of view the simple fact is the goal stood and it certainly didn’t change the game in the way that Mr Molby would like to think. For 30 minutes after that goal neither side offered anything but the half time talking of Jackett is clearly preferable to whatever was said in the Kidderminster dressing room.

Molby’s refusal to shake Jackett’s hand after the goal did him no favours whatsoever and put him towards the level of the likes of Keiths Curle and Alexander for dummy spitting.

The simple fact is Jan you have your work cut out with a team that offered nothing in terms of getting back into the game despite some talented players. Surely as a youngster in Denmark you were taught to play to the whistle, maybe that is something you need to instill in your players.

See you on Boxing Day, keep the pies warm for us!