Here’s what Falcons quarterback Matt Ryan had to say after the loss to the Saints:
On the state of the team. "We are disappointed with our performance today. We didn't play well enough. We had some opportunities on the offensive side of the ball. Put ourselves behind the chains with too many penalties, turnovers and missed opportunities."
On moving on to Carolina. "We are going to have to put that behind us and get ourselves back to work this week to see if we can find a way to get the job done next week. For us, it's pretty clear what's in front of us. We have to play better than we did today."
On if the offense lost its poise. "I don't know if it's lack of poise or whatever. Whatever the reason for the penalties, we have to figure that out. When you come into an environment like this and you're playing a very good opponent, it's critical to stay in front of the chains. You can't make mistakes. We made too many of them today. I thought we did some good things in terms of moving the ball, but weren't consistent enough with keeping it going. That's something that we have to correct. We have to be better than that moving forward."
On not scoring after getting the ball on the 2-yard line. "That's tough. The defense comes up with a great interception. Deion runs it down, first and goal. You want a touchdown in that situation. That's one of those missed opportunities that we talked about. We had two chances really, having the ball at the 1-yard line and came away with zero points. That was kind of the tale of the day. I also thought we had an opportunity to get points before the half. To turn the ball over there and that led to a touchdown. We put our defense in a tough spot. You can't do that in these type of games. We missed too many opportunities."
