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"I thought we were excellent and I thought everyone played well today. I'm a little disappointed though because we really should have killed the game off in the second half.
Dario pleased. Pulis makes excuses.
"I thought we were excellent and I thought everyone played well today. I'm a little disappointed though because we really should have killed the game off in the second half.
"After Steve (Jones) scored I thought we would go on and get a second and even a third. However maybe we weren't quite good enough to kill them off in the end, and that is what we have to work on.
"I thought we defended well though today. I told my centre backs at half time that if they played well we would get a point because Stoke we're just bombing us, but I thought they both did well.
"Andy Barrowman could have won it for us at the end. I thought he did really well today. He has done everything we have told him to do and worked really hard in training, maybe now we'll just work on his one on ones."
Stoke City manager Tony Pulis made excuses that his team are young, having 10 academy players in his 25 man squad.... nothing like the opposition who have 17.
“It was a very scrappy first-half from both sides and after that the first goal was always going to be very important,” he said.
“They got it just after the restart and from then on it was always going to be difficult for us because they are good at keeping the ball and posing you problems if you are trying to chase the game. I thought we kept going and showed a bit of character. We had a very young midfield and that’s a key area where you need that extra bit of experience to handle something like a derby game.
“I don’t like making excuses but the one thing we missed was a few more players out there who have been through a few of these derby battles and know how best to handle them. Also, we had to play a few players out of their usual position and we had a few square pegs in round holes and the balance of the team was not brilliant.”