Tony Pulis addresses Keiren Westwood error for Preston winner against Sheffield Wednesday
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Westwood, playing his first game at any level of football for a year having been frozen out of contention by previous boss Garry Monk, made a hash of a 48th-minute clearance and punched the ball straight to Tom Barkhuizen 16 yards out.
Speaking after the match, Pulis said that he had spoken to Westwood about the error and that the 36-year-old had explained he chose to punch instead of catch the ball because he had lost his footing.
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Hide Ad“I’ve not seen it, but he said his back foot slipped a bit and that’s what put him off,” Pulis said.
“He’s come forward and his back foot slipped, which is why he chose to punch it.
“It’s his mistake and he’s big enough and experienced enough to take it.”
“But there were a few challenges before the ball came into the box that I was really disappointed with.
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Hide Ad“The fact of the matter is that I want players at this football club to win those challenges. It’s something that maybe nobody has talked about before but I certainly will, because I think it’s very, very important.
“They’ve done brilliant today, they’ve worked their socks off with 10 men, under pressure from a team that’s been doing well in the Championship for a long, long time.
“There were just one or two challenges where I thought ‘yeah, our players should be coming out better than that’.”