Crawley Town head coach Harry Kewell: Even Chelsea boss Antonio Conte gets booed

Reds were booed off the field on Tuesday night after losing 2-0 in their League 2 home game against bottom-placed Chesterfield, a result which was followed by plenty of negative comments on Facebook.

The Crawley boss does not read comments about himself and his team on social media but knows supporters will criticise their club even if they are the Premier League champions.

Kewell said: “First and foremost, I don’t do social media. I think it’s a cheap way of people having a go.

“I’m very open, you can knock on my door, you can speak to me, you can voice your opinion, so I’ve got no qualms about that.

“You’ve got to understand Crawley has had some success in the past years when they went up to League 2 and they had a great FA Cup run and they had team and everyone’s relying on that.

“But don’t forget, that budget is triple what I’ve got.

“I’m dealing with a lot of stuff that is from last year, the players want to improve, we want to improve as a whole, and it takes time.

“For a small amount of people to criticise - they are criticising their own team - which is a shame, but you are going to get that in any football club regardless or whether you are Crawley or even Chelsea.

“I have a lot of friends and people within Chelsea - they can hear people boo Conte. I’m sure Chelsea won the title last year and then now they’re booing him!

“You are always going to get a minority of fans, home or away, badding you up because you don’t play exactly the way they want to do it.

“Crawley Town want to go further and higher in the leagues and where we have been over the last couple of years hasn’t been right for this club.

“We are dealing with what we are dealing with. The players and I and all the staff are working tremendously hard to get that right.

“It’s important the crowd play their part as well - the players don’t need to hear what they are saying: ‘Hoof the ball up in the middle of the park and hoof it back again’ we want them to hear: ‘Get that ball down, let’s be entertained, let’s create chances.’”

Here are a few of the comments made this week on Facebook by Crawley Town fans:

Paul Searle said: “Absolutely awful extremely embarrassing”

Roland Howard said: “Surely it’s due to signing inadequate players - not to mention a celebrity manager this term when we needed someone with a wealth of lower league experience?”

Steve Herbert wrote: “Considering we were playing the team who are bottom of the league & considering our manager is an ex top class striker. Why did we start tonight’s game with no recognised strikers on the pitch again!

“After the Newport game you would think HK & WF would learn. But obviously not.

“Absolutely pathetic tonight. I bet Luton can’t wait to play us on Saturday! Cricket score anyone?”

Steve Webb said: “I watched a better game at Three Bridges on Saturday.....if we get hammered by Luton and Kewell is still in charge Sunday, I’ll be going elsewhere to spend my hard earned cash on a Saturday afternoon.

“I’m no glory hunter, CTFC are my only team, but I want to be entertained, and at the moment watching paint dry is more entertaining....we have some decent players who are being managed by a clueless manager who has absolutely no idea about lower league football.”

Alfred Reynolds said: “After we defeated Swindon I commented we don’t need to do it against the teams at the top we need to beat the bread and butter rubbish sides then we beat Yeovil, which was great.

“However since then we’ve been pretty dire and we were considerably lucky against Morecambe but ground out results against them and Grimsby.

“I would expect a vastly improved performance again Luton, although I can’t see us beating them. The trouble is, like so many in-experienced managers, Kewell gets us motivated for the big games but doesnt realise our BIG games are actually against the teams in the bottom half. WAKE UP HARRY or your song will be ‘Harry, Harry Kewell, Harry you’ve not got a clue.’”