Darrell Clarke defends Wes McDonald Walsall change
Walsall manager Darrell Clarke was frustrated his side couldn’t hold on to more of their lead going into half-time against Exeter, but defended his decision to take winger Wes McDonald off at the break.
An Exeter own-goal and strikes from Caolan Lavery and Josh Gordon had Walsall 3-0 up after 30 minutes against the league’s second-placed team.
The Grecians’ leading goalscorer Ryan Bowman netted twice before half-time to get the home side back in the game before Lee Martin equalised in the second half.
At the interval, McDonald was replaced by centre-back Mat Sadler as the Saddlers changed from a 4-5-1 formation to a 5-3-2
.“Every time they put the ball into the box they looked like they were going to score, so it wasn’t rocket science to get an extra centre-half in,” he said. “Wes wasn’t having the best of games to be honest, but Wes is a great lad. My disappointment is that we didn’t keep it 3-1 or 3-0 at half-time.
“I probably would have made the same change because they were very dangerous pulling off Bowman, pulling off the diagonals, and we seemed to defend it better in the second half. That’s the way it goes – you have to sacrifice someone and unfortunately it was Wes.”
