Sport

McAuley: Red card was right call

NORTHERN Ireland defender Gareth McAuley had no qualms about the decision to send him off in Wednesday's dire goalless draw in Cyprus.

McAuley was back after two matches out to bolster a defence missing Jonny Evans and Aaron Hughes, but saw his night end early when he was dismissed for a messy lunge at Dimitris Christofis.

It was debatable whether the West Brom centre-back was guilty of denying a scoring opportunity - with the incident taking place close to the touchline 30 yards out - but the 34-year-old made no attempt to blame the referee.

"I wouldn't say it was harsh, it's within the rules of the game," he said after a turgid 0-0 shutout.

"I had a split-second to make the decision because their guy made a great pass in behind.

"I saw he was getting there first so I just took everything out. I nearly walked and I was just waiting for the red card really.

"I don't know if it was good decision or a bad one or what, but it denied a goalscoring opportunity and we got the clean sheet so we move on."

While McAuley did not have any issue with the official's performance, he was more critical of what he and his colleagues contributed on the night.

It was a performance as bad as any in recent memory from northern Ireland, devoid of attacking flair and frequently guilty of sloppy distribution. Tellingly, it was the visiting side who were most pleased to reach the end of each half unscathed against a side ranked 122nd in the world.

"It didn't spark," said McAuley.

"We've all got personal standards and I don't think enough of us reached them on this occasion.

"You go away and analyse your own performance and Michael will do that for the group. Next time we get together we'll speak about what we could have done better and there will be a lot of things on that list.

"In the first half we tried to play in the wrong areas. We invited pressure from them and got nervous, making a lot of mistakes on the ball.

"We need to learn from that because there are no mugs now in international football and we've got some tough games in the group where we can't invite pressure or allow them to get on the front foot."