'Naivety on a ridiculous scale' - Preston North End boss Alex Neil reacts to the heavy defeat to Cardiff City

The Lilywhites had a terrible time in South Wales, conceding in the first minute of both the first and second halves.

At 2-0 down they missed two penalties in quick succession, Paul Gallagher seeing his spot kick parried by Bluebirds goalkeeper Dillion Phillips only to be fouled as he got to the rebound.

Ched Evans stepped-up to take the second one with Gallagher still limping, Phillips again coming out on top and pushing the penalty away.

The home side took full advantage of that let-off and of some poor defending to go on and score two more goals.

Neil felt North End were the authors of their own downfall, losing possession in the build-up to the first two goals and then squandering the chance to get back into the game with the penalties.

"It was bizarre really to be honest," said Neil.

"To concede a penalty in the first minute, we tried to play short down their bottom channel and ended up giving away a throw in.

"We then gave away a penalty from the throw in to automatically give ourselves a mountain to climb.

"Then to take the centre for the start of the second half and literally give a goal away in the first 30 seconds is just incredible, it was naivety on a ridiculous scale really.

"At 2-0 we then gave ourselves the opportunity with a penalty which we miss. We then get another penalty which we again miss.

"That sort of summed it up for us. Then they got their third and fourth goals.

"The game finished 4-0 but it never felt like 4-0 in a million years. I have been involved in 4-0 games where you win or lose them and the game is very dominant for one team or the other.

"We caused all our own problems. The third goal was a mix-up between the goalkeeper and centre-back, and the fourth is a short back pass.

"If you make those types of mistakes against anybody at this level, you don't give yourself any opportunity to get anything from the game.

"It was a harsh lesson for us today, a sore one, a really sore one. But if I'm being honest we have only got ourselves to blame."

The early penalty which saw North End fall behind was on the soft side, Cardiff skipper Sean Morrison going to ground in the box under a Liam Lindsay challenge.

Neil felt it was a hard one to call but his annoyance was more at the fact his side had been in possession just moments earlier.

The PNE boss said: "For their penalty, I couldn't see a thing. There was a big melee of bodies, Morrison drops to the ground, shouts and the referee gives a penalty.

"I was more annoyed with the first bit in the fact we have the ball down the right hand side.

"What we wanted to do was turn the opposition in the first five or 10 minutes, play in their half of the pitch.

"Instead we play a back pass and Jordan Storey then has to rush to clear it out for a throw in rather than a corner.

"So we go from being in control of the situation to defending a long throw in."

Turning his attention to the second goal conceded just 27 seconds after the interval, Neil said: "We had Tom Barkhuizen who had come on at half-time to run and get in behind them because the game had been played in front of Cardiff too much.

"We play the ball into Tom's feet, he takes a poor touch and they break off the back of that. We didn't recover quick enough and the game is almost over at that point and we were literally 30 seconds back on the pitch.

"I have never really seen anything like that where you concede in the first minute of the first half and the first minute of the second half.

"Then we made two further errors for the third and fourth goals.

"When we got the penalty we were on top of the play although we were trailing 2-0.

"Anthony Gordon had a positive impression on the game, he gave us some impetus and Gally's use of the ball gave us impetus.

"If we had scored to make it 2-1, I was thinking 'game on' but to then miss two penalties in a row summed the game for us."

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