Jason admits he was offside

By Derek Davis

TOWERING Blues defender turned attacker Jason De Vos last night admitted he was offside when he played the ball for Nicky Forster to snatch the late winner at Hillsborough.

The Canadian had stayed behind in good old-fashioned goal-hanging style, although he calls it by the ice hockey term of hogging, after a corner was half-cleared and took Gavin Williams' pass like an accomplished winger before sliding the ball across for Forster to finish

Wednesday players were furious, and surrounded the referee, but the linesman had been caught out of position and did not flag for offside, although De Vos admits the official got it wrong.

He said: “I thought I was offside. I was waiting for the referee to blow his whistle but in situations like that you just play on until you hear the whistle.

“I knew the lads were queuing up in the centre of goal so I had to get the ball across as soon as I could and Nicky Forster has buried it into the corner.”

The Blues deserve a bit of good fortune and Forster deserved his first goal in six weeks.

De Vos said: “It was great for Nicky, as it has been a while since his last goal.

“We needed someone of Nicky's quality to finish something like that.

“It was not an easy one to finish but he took it well.”

De Vos was delighted that the team had kept its first clean sheet September at Leeds United but admitted they had to do it playing ugly.

Keeper Lewis Price pulled off a couple of excellent saves, Richard Naylor had to clear off the line after an error by Sito, while Town also survived an appeal from Wednesday that the ball had crossed the line from a corner before it was scrambled clear.

De Vos said: “We can't kid anyone and try and convince them it was an attractive game because it was not.

“The pitch was terrible and made it difficult to pass the ball and so was not conducive to attractive football.

“We had to roll our sleeves up to match them and I felt we did that and we battled really well.

“We defended as a team and I'm more pleased with a clean sheet because that has been a long time coming.

“It has frustrated us defenders, who look at clean sheets as strikers look at goals, so we are pleased to have finally kept one.

“Lewis has made a couple of great saves and kept us in it and, when their lad got on Sito's back-pass and went round the keeper, Bam Bam was there to clear it off the line.”