We caught up with Eric Kinder shortly after the 3-2 defeat at Macclesfield on Saturday:

"The result hasn't gone for us but the thing I am most concerned about at the moment is that it looks like I've lost Steve Hindmarch for Wednesday.

He turned over on his ankle in the 3rd minute of the game and I took him off straight away. It's not looking too good for us at all, but we'll assess it on Monday and see where we are at with it. It's the nightmare scenario that we talked about when we played Accrington, because the last thing you want is for your players to be getting injured ahead of the Cup game. We came through the Accrington game but, unfortunately, I don't think we've been as lucky this time round. We rested Gary Madine as well, as a precaution for him, and he should be fine for the game against Southend.

We were 2-1 up, and we should have closed the game out in all honesty. We didn't manage to do that, and we defended poorly for their goals.

We conceded a really sloppy goal after just 12 minutes, which was disappointing, but Andy Cook got us back on level terms after half an hour. He smashed a direct free kick through the wall, from just outside the box, and it flew in to the bottom corner. I thought we'd kick on after that, but we went in to the break all square.

Ged Dalton put us ahead after 60 minutes, when he ran on to a terrific ball from Matt Brown. He got himself behind the back four and lobbed the keeper as he came off his line. We were then looking for them to calm things down and keep control of the game. We let our defending go in the last 20 minutes, and we conceded two really poor goals from our point of view, and that's why we ended up losing.

I'm saying the same things as I was when we played Accrington, because it isn't acceptable. I have to ask whether they have Wednesday on their minds, because it could be a factor. Having said that, if I get a performance off them against Southend like I did against Manchester United, then I'll be very happy with that. We looked really sluggish in this one, though. We didn't look right at all, and that's disappointing. It's been a poor day for us.

It was a scrappy game overall. We played on the first team pitch, so it was an excellent surface, and we've no complaints about that at all. We just never really got going. We weren't arrogant or up ourselves in the way we were at Accrington, but we couldn't find the spark that we needed. There was no pattern to what we were doing, but I suppose you could say that the injury to Steven will have affected us, especially with it coming so early in the game.

Like I say, we got to half time at 1-1 and we then scored to edge ourselves in front. At that point we should really be killing them off and stopping them from playing. We are good enough to do that, but we didn't manage it in this one. We didn't play like a team, we didn't work for each other, our passing was poor and we were continually giving away silly free kicks. Andy Cook did well up front, but we didn't use our cutting edge as well as we have done this season. It just wasn't our day. The goals we gave away were shocking, there's no other way to describe it. It was poor defending.

I haven't had to say this on too many occasions this season, but our central defenders were a little bit off colour today. They got caught in possession a couple of times, and they were punished when we conceded goals from it. As a team we didn't defend very well either, but we can pick that up again.

I'm not particularly bothered about the result to be honest. I'm more concerned about Steve Hindmarch and whether he will come through for Wednesday. My gut reaction is that I don't think he'll make it. Dolly will work on him through the early part of the week and we'll see where we go from there.

I think the Cup run has definitely affected our League performance, but you can argue that is the way it should be. If you'd asked me at the start of the season about whether I'd want a Cup run or to be top of the table, there's only one answer from me. The FA Youth Cup is a prestigious competition. It puts you in the limelight, as we have already seen, and it gets people talking about you. The Macclesfield staff were telling me that they have never seen as many scouts at one of their Youth games, but the thing for them is that they caught us on a bad day. We just weren't very good at all. I do think you have to expect a run like this to have some kind of impact. The media attention after the games against Sheffield and Manchester was huge. Nobody cared about the League result in between, they weren't interested, and it'll be the same for this one. I bet they are all there on Wednesday though.

It was a different performance from us today, but we've now lost two games that we shouldn't have. The Accrington defeat was all about bad attitude, but there was nothing wrong with our attitude at all today. It just didn't happen for us. We tried to play, we tried to make it happen, but it just wasn't there for us.

I've said all along that I'm not too concerned about the League title. The idea has always been, and will always be, to get as many players through to a full contract as we can. We have always wanted to have a good go in the Cup competitions, and that's still the same. We've got quite a few fixtures still to go, and it's inevitable that you will lose some, but the League was always something that the lads talked about as a possibility. These are young lads, and they won't all play well every single week, because they are still learning the game. I'll accept this performance more as long as we put it right on Wednesday."  

Team - Carson, Brown, Wordsworth, Aldred, Duffy, Lakeland (Dalton 59), Blake, Wood (Dowson 75), Hindmarch (Seaton 3), Cook, Tinnion. Subs - Mitchell, Laquan Biney.

Other news from Eric:

"Grant Carson played his last game for us today. I thought his last one was against Accrington, but we had him for one more and used him in this one.

Shaun Law, our U16 team captain, has accepted a two-year contract with us, and we're pleased about that. He's one we'll see more of in the future.

Laquan Biney came with us today, and he is another member of our U16 set-up. He's been with us before, and we actually used him as a sub against Chesterfield in the Youth Alliance Cup. I'm having a look at him and we'll see how that develops."