Manager on the Orient game
United manager Greg Abbott gave us his reaction to the away defeat at Leyton Orient on Saturday evening.
“It was a very, very disappointing day for us,” he said. “I thought we were getting to grips with the game and then a few of the key incidents and decisions went against us. I wouldn’t say that heads dropped but we didn’t recover and we made life very hard for ourselves.
“Everyone wants to put their finger on why you lose like that but it’s one of those days when nothing seemed to go our way. From the injury to Danny [Livesey] and then the two goals before half time, it was one of those games where the things we needed to go our way just haven’t happened.
“I think the real disappointment is because we felt we’d done the work against Crawley and Brentford to get ourselves off on another little run. We’ve let two sloppy goals in and when you’re up against a team with a bit of form and confidence that is never going to make things easy.
“We can sit and feel sorry for ourselves because we’ve had one hit the post and then a clearance off the line which would have made things different. We were on top and if we’d got a goal it would have given us that lift which always comes when you score. As it was we have switched off and gifted them a two-goal cushion, and suddenly we are looking at an uphill job.
“Goals are what the game is all about and we haven’t made Orient work hard enough to get them today. I have talked this week about he fact that we have got rid of the silly goals, and then I’m left scratching my head because that has come back to haunt us. We have had a real heart-to-heart in the dressing room because we know that it wasn’t good enough from us. We desperately want to finish the season off properly for everybody, but we won’t do that if we go back to giving away sloppy goals in silly situations.
“The handball is one we want to see again. Mark [Gillespie] is adamant that the ball was on the line and that is one of those key situations which have gone against us. It’s harsh for him but it’s something we just have to deal with.
“Results like this hurt everybody. It’s hard to defend because we are coming away from a heavy defeat and we have to try and explain why that happened. The fans have turned out in huge numbers for us and they feel just as hurt as we do. Again, we got ourselves into a position where people might just have been starting to believe in what we were doing and we have pulled the rug out from under ourselves.
“What we do now is get back in next week and start working hard to put it right. We’ve had to keep saying that this season, and that’s something else we are not happy about. We have been far too inconsistent and that’s why we have struggled to keep our good runs going. We have the players and staff here to perform much better in terms of results and we have to start doing that.
“It’s been very tough for us because we have been used to being up at the other end of things. Maybe a bit of inexperience or the situation we are in has affected things on the pitch, but we feel that we’re going to come through it all to be in a much stronger position. It’s when things aren’t so good that you really find out about people, and the good thing for us is that everyone is determined to continue the fight. We want to be winning games and picking up points. There’s a huge determination to make that happen for everyone.
“The fans are frustrated because they care. That’s exactly the same for us, I can assure you of that. A performance and result like this simply isn’t good enough. We have to take the criticism for what it is, because we haven’t given ourselves anything to argue with today. Our fans stayed behind to clap every player after the Brentford win so I think they every right to question us after this one. They feel the same anger and frustrations as every single one of us in that dressing room and they want wins as much as we do. That’s why we will work this week to try to make sure we are getting those results.”
