Richie Wellens gets brutally honest in his post-match interview after Leyton Orient lose 4-0 to Salford City in FA Cup Second Round.
The League Two side hammered and left their League One opposition frustrated, to reach the FA Cup third round for the second year running.
An own goal by Orient keeper Killian Cahill, deflected Kadeem Harris cross, put Salford ahead on 23 minutes, Kallum Cesay curled in from another Harris assist on 59′ minutes, with sub Fabio Borini slotting home with around 10 minutes remaining, then Kelly N’Mai lobbed Cahill from a long ball in added time.
Interviewer: Hard luck tonight, conceding four goals…
Richie: Hard luck?! That was not hard luck. From our point of view, nowhere near good enough, up first 20 minutes, slow, boring, no tempo, no desire. I think as bad as we were, you have to give them credit. They were very good, bright, wanted to play.
“Too many of us sulking, pitch isn’t good enough, heard them speaking after the warm-up. Pitch is not this, pitch isn’t great. They played the same pitch and could deal with the ball.
“For us, yeah, nowhere near good enough. Too inconsistent at the moment. When we get beat, we concede too many goals. When we play well, we win and we look good.
“So yeah, so many questions to answer. You look at our performance on Saturday and it’s really, really good in terms of intensity, duels, all the basics of the game and today, I mean the goals.
“The first goal, the third goal. The first goal is goalkeeper mistake. Second goal, we roll it out, goes over Omar’s foot. We give a goal away. Third goal, Jack Simpson’s hand on the ball in half-way line, and the fourth goal is just… the goals are ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous.
“But for all… how poor the goals were, can’t… they were miles better than us. I can tell you’re disappointed when angry with your team’s performance.”
“Too many of our players were sulking. Our performance was embarrassing and shambolic”
Richie Wellens with one of the most brutal post-match interviews you’ll see 😳
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— Football on TNT Sports (@footballontnt) December 5, 2025
Interviewer: “When you hear things like the pitch is not good enough before the game, those things can easily creep into the performance. Is that something that you’ll address with your players after today?”
Richie: “Well, you can’t make excuses. We played Tamworth in the last game, so the pitch is a lot better than Tamworth. Now even when we were clearing it we couldn’t kick the ball. Technique wasn’t good enough. Decision making, angles to work early to be able to play in not so good pitches. I say, they played the same pitch and they were well worthy winners in terms of our performance. It was embarrassing and shambolic.”
Interviewer: “Where do you start to correct performances like that with your players? Honestly, we’ve had two of these before.”
Richie: “We’ve had Mansfield away, we’ve had Wycombe away. And sometimes, I keep saying it, I’m sick of saying it, when you get so many players that new to the club you get inconsistencies.
“You’ve also got young players in that that are starting out their careers. Dom Ballard’s a second highest goalscorer but at the moment he’s having a little bit of inconsistency in the way that he plays. couple of others.
“But listen, we’re a group. We’ll batten down the hatches, we’ll go again. But there no circumstances. Our supporters have finished work early today. They had a day off work, I finished early and come up here and support us. And that was nowhere near good enough.”
Salford City head coach Karl Robinson speaking to TNT Sports:
“I’m made up. Because they control the ball and try and play and find little pockets, it’s a little bit easier to try and work on your shape.
“But then you need the quality in transition to make sure you hurt them.
“I felt in the first half, we were terrible at that. Our final ball was a bit sloppy. At half-time, I said: ‘If you get in, you’ve got to take your chance against a good team.’
“I’m really proud of the reaction. They’re great lads – a pleasure to work with.”
Salford City’s Kelly N’Mai speaking to TNT Sports about Salford’s second goal:
“I got the last touch but I’ve already got one so I’ll give one to Kal [Cesay].”
On who he wants to face in the third round: “Anyone, I don’t care. Last year we had City and got absolutely pumped, so hopefully an easy one this season but we don’t really mind.”
On the result: “We had a gameplan and we worked on it all week. As you can see from that performance, it’s very well done by the gaffer. We got the win, a 4-0 win as well.”
Salford City player of the match Kallum Cesay speaking to TNT Sports:
“It was a great night. We stuck to our plan, played the conditions and got the result.”
On whether the second goal was his or Kelly N’Mai’s: “I can’t see the touch [from N’Mai].”
On who he wants to face in the next round: “Anyone, anyone in the Prem.”
Fans gave their reaction as Richie Wellens gets brutally honest in post-match interview after Leyton Orient lose 4-0 to Salford…
@Orientsphincter: Publicly name and shame the 20 year old second leading scorer who youve said had a scan this week and is carrying an injury according to you. Worked brilliantly with Koroma didn’t it. After he’d got 5 consecutive assists 😂😂 What a joker
@bayley_andrewp: Honest assessment and all fans feel the same- players not fit to wear the shirt.
@Murphy10n : So refreshing to hear a manager being honest about things and not waffling like ours ⚽️👍
@BigGazLaw: Love Wellens. You get no bollocks from him.
@gmapleth: I appreciate this sort of interview comes a bit easier when you have credit in the bank as manager, but what a breath of fresh air. If I was an Orient fan who’d taken half a day off to go to that weird little ground, I’d be pleased with this.
@phillo07: Great to hear a manager speak open and honestly not the usual tripe that’s normally spouted ! 👏
@Scotty_mc10: Silly line to open with, as Richie Said it was nothing to do with luck, very honest interview from a top manager 👏🏻
@daniel_d44: One thing about Wellens is his honesty. Almost word for word was how I summed up the game. Slow, lethargic, no tempo and second to everything. How many passes were just hooks that went nowhere. This team is very un-Wellens-like in terms of consistency #lofc
@AmzLOFC: Get one of the senior players to do an interview. I want to see their reaction from getting docked 2 weeks pay
@Lee02768836Lee: Pathetic performance i can’t even be bothered to go Tuesday now why would I wanna watch a brunch of clown’s who can’t even be bothered so why should I go out the cold to watch that shite show.
@Bensaddington8: Tbh every single defender at this football club I’d be happy to see leave in January.
@jake_murphy95: Woke up this morning, hoping it was just a bad dream, I could only watch snippets of the game but from what I saw, it wasn’t great at all. When we’re good, we’re great, when we’re bad, we’re extremely poor. I just don’t understand it 😂
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