Glenn Roeder accused his opposite number of “talking rubbish” after City's revival was blown off course at Cruel Britannia Stadium at the weekend.

Glenn Roeder accused his opposite number of “talking rubbish” after City's revival was blown off course at Cruel Britannia Stadium at the weekend.

The Canaries were heading for an invaluable point in the Potteries before Richard Cresswell's 89th-minute goal gave Stoke a 2-1 victory.

But Tony Pulis' post-match assessment clearly didn't sit kindly with Roeder.

The Stoke manager - sent to the stands after a second-half tirade at the referee - claimed Norwich were outbattled, outworked, outplayed and should have been beaten by five or six goals

Roeder's reaction was rather less dramatic, but a sight more cutting.

“I think Tony Pulis has just spoken a load of rubbish - write that,” he said, before adding. “But he is entitled to his opinion, that is the beauty of this game, and I am entitled to mine.”

Roeder added: “He is probably upset by the referee sending him to the stand because he didn't stop moaning all afternoon at the referee.

“As far as I am concerned that is absolute nonsense, rubbish. He has probably got excited because he has won the game in the last minute.

“I will take my view and I am confident we were worth at least a point. Stoke can move forward and we will move forward to our midweek game. That sort of comment just passes over my head as if it had never been said.”

The recalled Darren Huckerby had given City a fifth-minute lead, which they deservedly held until half-time, but within a minute of the restart Stoke had equalised.

Norwich appeared to have weathered the storm that followed, before Cresswell popped up with a late heart-breaker that left City rooted to the bottom of the table when a point would have seen them climb two places.

“The start and the finish of the second half ruined what potentially could have been an excellent day for us,” said Roeder.

“I would concede that Stoke put a lot of pressure on us in the second half, but I would also say that we were by far the better team in the first half and I thought we let them off the hook a little bit just only being one up at half-time.

“It is not a good experience, but we live to fight another day. They played with a lot of courage overall.”

Norwich had won their last two games, but Roeder dropped Jamie Cureton, rested Luke Chadwick and brought in Huckerby and Lee Croft in a 4-5-1 starting formation - with Gary Doherty replacing migraine victim Jon Otsemobor at right back.

And while the plan worked well for 45 minutes, Roeder believed City were guilty of failing to make full use of lethal weapon Huckerby after the break.

“It was a great start, a well worked goal - Hucks scoring off his left foot as well, which is always a bonus,” he said.

“We didn't use him enough the second half, we didn't get the ball out to him enough. You try and get these messages on to players but you would like to think they would recognise that themselves.

“Huckerby is a real threat in this division, a real threat, and where we got him on the ball plenty of times in the first half, the second half overall we starved him and that was to our detriment.

“You need players to recognise where your strengths are and you hope they can take that responsibility of shifting the ball out as often as possible to where your strength is - Huckerby is very much a potential match-winner for us, and often has been. He just didn't see enough of the ball.”