IPSWICH Town manager Paul Jewell slammed his players for taking their foot off the gas after they finished the season with a 3-2 win at rock-bottom Doncaster.

Tommy Smith’s header and Ryan Stevenson’s fantastic 30-yard strike had the Blues in complete control against a powder puff Doncaster side inside half an hour.

The Blues failed to kill the game off though, conceded a 34th minute goal to Fabien Robert and suddenly looked very vulnerable.

Jason Scotland won and converted a penalty in the 77th minute of a dire second half, though the Blues still found time to concede a sloppy consolation in the dying moments as Habib Beye forced the ball home following a deep free-kick.

With Town finishing 15th in the Championship table, Jewell said: “It’s nice to finish with a victory, but I wouldn’t say it was a high. At 2-0 up we were cruising, but they get back in it at 2-1 and then we have a distinctly average second half.

“With the standards I’ve got we need to improve the squad.”

He continued: “The manner we concede goals, well, we’re just not good enough. We don’t do the simple things well enough. The problem with us is we get 2-0 up and then we don’t carry on doing the simple things that got us to that stage.

“There are too many players who think they can flick it, people give silly fouls away, I even saw a player today (Tommy Smith) give them the ball back for a free-kick. I couldn’t believe it, I’ve never seen that before. We should win the fair play league for that.

“I’m really annoyed and angry today because at 2-0 we were playing well, we should kill them off, we don’t and then we always seem susceptible to goals.”

He added: “We were in control, looked like we were going to score every time we went forward, but we then give teams a foothold in games because we stop doing the simple things, the unglamorous things that have got us into those situations.

“Once we start thinking we’ve cracked it we’re nowhere near a good enough team.”

With 16-year-old Byron Lawrence coming off the bench in the 80th minute to become the club’s second youngest player ever (behind Connor Wickham), Jewell said: “He’s lively. You see the keeper making a save at the end, who was following in? It was Byron. We’ve been trying to get him the team for a while and today I thought I’d give him 10 minutes after the third goal.”

Jimmy Bullard also came off the bench in the second half for a rare appearance. With the midfielder still under contract for another year, and Lee Bowyer and Grant Leadbitter set to leave the club, Jewell said: “Jimmy’s had his difficulties with illnesses and other stuff, but here’s here next year. Every team is picked on its merits, no-one is in the team or out the door.

“I just think today highlighted the fact that we need four or five quality players to come into our squad.”

– For match analysis and more reaction, see Monday’s EADT.