Heeley hot under the collar over discipline (From Worcester News)

Heeley hot under the collar over discipline

6:20pm Sunday 7th March 2010

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CARL Heeley slammed Worcester City’s poor discipline following their 1-0 defeat to Hampton and Richmond Borough.

Trailing to Barrie Matthews’ 84th-minute penalty, Rob Elvins was shown a straight red card for violent conduct during a flare-up as Worcester pushed for an equaliser.

Elvins now faces a four-game ban — three for the red card and an extra match because he has already been sent off this season, ironically against the same opponents.

He is set to miss the matches against St Albans, Maidenhead, Staines and Bath City before returning for the final three games of the season.

The incident comes barely two weeks after left-back Shabir Khan was sent off against Newport County, also earning him a four-game suspension.

Caretaker manager Heeley fumed: “I didn’t see the incident but what I’m not happy about is the lack of discipline.

“That has cost us all season, whether that’s a lack of discipline with challenges and getting sent off or being able to defend for 90 minutes. It’s cost us dearly all season and it doesn’t look like it’s going to go away.

“You can’t legislate for injuries but you can’t deal with stupid sending offs that are our own players’ actions.

“I’m not prepared to stand for it because between Sha-bir and Elvins they will have missed 14 games which is unacceptable when we’ve got our backs to the wall with a small squad and we’re battling to stay in the league.”

Elvins was also at the centre of penalty appeal which went against the hosts in second-half stoppage-time and Heeley was left perplexed at the decision.

He said: “It’s one of three things — it’s either a corner, a penalty or a yellow card to Elvins for diving and the referee gave none of them.

“I can’t see how that can be the case, that is as clear a stonewall penalty as I’ve ever seen.”

But the City boss, who also admitted captain Tom Kemp was not fully fit, was more concerned at his team’s lack of cutting edge.

He said: “The performance wasn’t good enough irrespective of the penalties, we did not do enough — we were poor.

“The game’s over now, we’ve just got to move on to the next one.

“It’s tough but we’ve got to pick ourselves up.

“I’m sure the teams around us are not going to give up and we can’t give up either.

“We are in a scrap and we’ve got to roll our sleeves up and show what character we’ve got.”