Graham Alexander says Bradford did not get their just rewards for a dominant performance at Crewe, for whom Chris Long’s first-half penalty proved decisive in a 1-0 home win.
The Railwaymen were indebted to two stunning saves from young keeper Tom Booth which thwarted Andy Cook and Jonathan Tomkinson in the closing minutes. Cook also had a second-half set-piece header chalked off for offside as the Bantams went down to their first defeat in seven games.
“I don’t think we got what we deserved from that performance. It’s a disappointing result as we dominated and created the best chances in the game,” said Alexander.
“Crewe have got a decent home record, but the penalty is the only shot they had on target – Harry Lewis didn’t have a save to make for the rest of the game.
“I’m gutted, although it was a penalty and we just switched off for 10 seconds in the game. We kept Crewe far away from our goal and created a lot of opportunities. We were a bit careless with our deliveries at times when we got up there, but when we showed that quality we should have scored.
“I was struggling at half-time to find a way to improve it. They had scored, but we’d defended exceptionally well apart from a 10-second spell when they got the penalty and when we lost focus. But I thought we could have had a couple of penalties ourselves with the way Andy Cook was manhandled throughout the game.
“We did create chances, we hit the bar and their keeper has made a couple of good saves.
“All in all we should have got more points over the holiday period, but we have won games previously when we haven’t played as well as we have today.”
Since Alexander’s appointment as manager in early November, Bradford had won four times and drawn twice, including a morale-boosting home draw with leaders Stockport last Friday.
But they were behind in the 13th minute when some panicked defending from Norwich loanee Tomkinson offered Long the opportunity after he was tripped to send keeper Lewis the wrong way from the resulting spot-kick.
The Bantams responded to the early setback in a direct fashion, but failed to muster much in the way of clear opportunities in the first half, save from when Tyler Smith found some space to connect with Clarke Oduor’s cross, only to divert the ball just past the far post.
After the break, though, Bradford ramped up the pressure. The offside flag went up against Cook as the striker got above Booth to head in Richie Smallwood’s free-kick.
Crewe sub Elliott Nevitt blasted over in a rare home attack. But after Alexander made a raft of changes the chances kept coming. Substitute Vadaine Oliver went close with a header which crept past the post.
Cook went even closer when Booth tipped his powerful header from Bobby Pointon’s cross onto the bar. And the home keeper dived across to keep Tomkinson’s header from hitting the bottom corner in the final seconds of stoppage time.
Crewe boss Lee Bell said: “I’m delighted with the win and for the players as they’re top fellows who want to do well for the club. We had to battle for it, but we knew we had to do that as you can’t stop the ball being thrown towards your box.
“We played the game properly and we tried to play in the right moments – our professionalism and game management was excellent. It was a lovely move to get up there and Longy took the penalty really well.
“We’ve got players who want to do really well as they’re an honest bunch of hard-working lads. Courtney Baker-Richardson worked his socks off and put his body on the line. Their centre-halves had a tough time against him and it is such a big help to us when he performs like that.
“And Luke Offord was the best player on the pitch, he loves getting stuck in and he enjoys every side of the game.”
