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Steve Evans refuses to shake hands as fans joke he’s ‘livid inside’ after Rotherham lose to Exeter

Steve Evans refuses to shake hands as fans joke he’s ‘livid inside’ after Rotherham United lose 1-0 to Exeter City on Saturday.

Caleb Watts came off the bench and scored the only goal of the game in the 71st minute to make it a disappointing return to League One for the Millers.

And it could have been by a bigger scoreline if Grecians made the most of their clear cut chances having dominated for large spells, in what was an entertaining league opener in Devon.

Exeter City: Whitworth, Niskanen, Sweeney ©, Crama, Yfeko (Purrington), Harper (Watts), McMillan, Francis, Cole (Alli), Aitchison (Borges), Magennis

Substitutes: MacDonald, Purrington, Fitzwater, Alli, Watts, Diabate, Borges

Rotherham United: Phillips, Rafferty, Brammall, Raggett, Clarke-Harris © (Nombe), Hugill, Hungbo, Odoffin, Humphreys, Tiehi, McCart (Powell)

Substitutes: Dawson, James, Powell, Nombe, MacDonald, Osong, Holmes

Attendance: 7,458 (901 away)

INTERVIEW WITH STEVE EVANS:

Interviewer: Steve, a 1-0 defeat on the opening day of this season first of all just your thoughts on your team’s performance

Steve: I think we’re pretty average in all honesty. all over the pitch today I don’t think we come off the pitch thinking that any individual’s performed at the top end of the game, I think the game was competitive I think there’s chances at both ends, they take advantage from sloppy defending to a back stick to get the goal, we don’t take advantage of four really good chances on a post chance in the middle of the goal, but if you don’t do that you know it has to be done at both ends, so I think a defeat is harsh but we’ll have to live it and make the journey home

Interviewer: How long could it take to to see your team at full flow?

Steve: Yeah listen it takes every team time to get going, so we turn up and say we’re pretty average today to come to Exeter, 9 hour journey in the coach yesterday is a pretty hard open day fixture everyone I think manager, just spoke to at the League Manager Association meeting agreed with that it’s a particular hard one but you have to come here you cannot come here and miss four chances in the last 10 minutes of a game and and lose you have to take those chance, I just said to the players you know good teams take those chances I’ve been here with good rather on sides that would take those chances but you know you kind of be heading over the bar from four yards, you can’t be shooting over the bar from eight yards you know, you can’t be putting a header wide from the middle of the goal, these are clear clear cut chances so but listen you know we’ll take the defeat and we’ll move on.

Interviewer: Do you take heart from the fact that even though the performance wasn’t what you wanted you still created?

Steve: Yeah listen, players gave everything, absolutely everything, so we know here can’t go home all doom and gloom and blaming effort and commitment and passion, we lots of that with a fantastic travelling support who tried to help us the sen is the last 10-15 minutes well probably the last 10 minutes after they scored in the late stages for the goal really but as we said to the players we can’t give a bad goal away and then take that as a reaction to play with the real purpose that we play with and a real high tempo um but we’ll we’ll have to learn from we’ll learn from it quickly

On when he made the decision to put Dillon Phillips in goal, with most fans expecting, Cameron Dawson, Evans said: ‘It was fifty/fifty right up to lunch time today. But I got it right didn’t I?’ Phillips did make some good saves and didn’t seem to panic when City were having a siege on the Millers goal. ‘We have two good goalkeepers. All through pre-season we were finding it difficult to split them when we were measuring their performances. Dillon got the nudge and he performed particularly well.’

On the forward pairing of Jonson Clarke-Harris and Jordan Hugill?: ‘Sam (Nombe) was poor in training this week so he dropped out of the team. Players have to learn that you have to turn up in training and not be pretty poor and expect to be in the starting team. He made a good, positive impact when he came on which is the Sam Nombe we know. I thought all the substitutions were right. We changed the shape of the team, changed the system and became the dominant side.’

INTERVIEW WITH GARY CALDWELL:

Interviewer: Gary you said after the opening day 3-0 win at Wycombe, you still weren’t happy last season. Are you happy after a 1-0 win after Rotherham.

Gary: I’ve just said to the players I think I think they can be even better, but we asked them to play with courage we asked them to play with personality and I thought that the way they played was was incredible against a very good team, a physical team, a team that’s going to be right up there come the end of the season.

We showed courage right from the first minute we played with an identity a belief in that identity we created good chances especially early second half and you always felt like it was a 1-0 game Rotherham were always in the game with the the set piece threat that they have the physicality that they have Noms came on and we’ve seen you know over the years when he was here what Noms can do in terms of you know bustling around the box and getting shots off.

But we stood up to it and we kept creating chances we scored a fantastic goal and although we were you know hanging on at the end in terms of the finishers coming on and and players obviously not quite up to full 90 minutes.

I couldn’t be happier with the team in the first game but it’s only a start it’s a long 10 months I just said to the group you know all the players were in there the the players that weren’t in the squad today and I said we’re going to need everyone we need to all be together for a long hard 10 months but it’s a great start.

As mentioned, Steve Evans refuses to shake hands as fans joke he’s ‘livid inside’ after Rotherham lose to Exeter…

@markfrost79: In other news, water is wet. Evan’s is never happy…probably contributed to what I thought was a poor interview afterwards bigging himself up on the goalie selection and digging out Nombe.

@babylonrass: He’s livid and trying to hide it but can’t

@tlangdon_: Would’ve been nice for him to give Exeter a bit of credit and swallow his pride a bit

@datho_rl: How we lack quality in league one is baffling. But then again we’d have to take advantage of our chances when we only make 2 per game from set pieces

@adawri81: Not sure he knows the best 11, but that was certainly not it. Slow passing, slow pressing, lack of quality and very little threat. I know it’s early days, but if that’s a sign of things to come…….😬

@TomHayball: What a sore loser. Might help to be gracious in defeat and show some respect to the opposition.

@MightyMillers20: Got what we deserved that was woeful

@teamslikerufc: Pretty woeful, thank Phillips for not allowing it to be 3-0 loss. Gonna put this one down to opening day jitters

@xsbfcreece: CHEEREEEER UP STEVIE EVANSSSSSS

@rubesbfc: ‘but… but… but we’re winning the league with our 162574 signings and our stevie 🥺🥺🥺’

@Callum__RUFC: What a fucking shitshow expecting a lot more at home next week

@_georgem22_: thought you were gonna piss the league

@GlynMillsom: Should have been 2 or 3 nil, totally outclassed today

@adawri81: Pretty terrible that. Was expecting so much more. No statement made there, other teams looking with nothing to fear.

@Hannn_95x: Poor all round that. 2nd to every ball, played so deep and the midfield were non existent. Get the formation changed to a 442 with Hungbo & Powell on wings and nombe behind the strikers (unless you start him up top). Praise for Phillips today. Exeter fans were class #rufc #ecfc

@craighawley: Don’t spend money you can’t expect to win owt .., Don’t talk the talk TS and now keep ya hand in ya pocket !!!!

@_georgem22_: you guys were outclassed, played off the pitch, Sweeney had clark-harris in his back pocket, getting done by little old Exeter xx

@GazNov04: Love what he did for our club, transformed it but I have to admit, towards the end his constant moaning and blame game was getting tedious to listen to, especially when his constant tinkering of the squad was the real reason we slipped off at the end… Got very frustrating…

@MartinAllenSmth: He has always been classless. Whatever his managerial record, the way he conducts himself is simply unprofessional.

@MJCollins97: Fucking shambles. Wrong team from that start. Fair play to Exeter deserved it massively, but that’s awful from us.

@RUFC_James07: Absolutely honking. Nombe only cunt who did anything and get hugill as far away from Rotherham as is humanly possibly

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