Gary Brabin had mixed feelings after Saturday's nil-nil draw at York City, the division's draw specialists. Whilst delighted with another clean sheet and the display of his defenders and captain Paul Carden, Brabin described United's attacking play as "non-existent".

"I don't think we deserved any more than a draw today," he told the media afterwards.

"I'm delighted with the doggedness we've shown, I'm delighted with the clean sheet, and I'm delighted with a couple of individual performances, especially the captain Paul Carden - I thought he was outstanding today.

"But I thought there were a few below-par performances and overall I wasn't happy with the performance. We're a lot better than that. York aren't a bad side and I think we let them play too much football, especially in the first half.

"We had a little chat at half-time and I don't think we picked it up as much as I would have liked in the second half, so I changed it around a bit and we looked a little bit better at 4-4-2, but as a team we're a lot better than we showed today.

"On the other hand there are some big plusses for us," he added. "I'm delighted with the clean sheet and a dogged nil-nil away from home. That's not a bad result but today a few of those lads have fallen below the standards they've shown me, day in, day out."

Brabin opted to recall Lee McEvilly and start with a three man attack, and he explained it was because of the form those three men had shown and the success of that formation against Wrexham last month.

"We've got some good forwards and they're all chomping at the bit to play, I thought it worked well against Wrexham, and Macca (McEvilly) came on and did great for 20 minutes on Sunday so I wanted to put him in again. He had a bit to prove and he did well in the first half - his work-rate was good and that's what I want - but as a team we just didn't get the ball down and play as much football as I'd like.

"We didn't do the things we work on every day in training, and as a team I know the lads are a lot better than that."

Brabin reserved praise for his defence, and admitted he has not mentioned them enough after recent games: "I've probably been a little bit critical in not praising them too much because I've come to expect that now. But I don't think you'll get a better back four than Glees, Phil Bolland, Wayne Hatswell and Anthony Tonkin, and there was a great save from Pottsy as well in the first half to keep it nil-nil.

"They've been outstanding week in, week out, for me, and Paul Carden in front of them was the pick of the bunch for me. The amount of ground he covered today, covering his team-mates, was outstanding.

"I just thought our attacking play was non-existent. We're a lot better than that."

Summarising the positives and negatives from the game, which saw United drop one place in the table to sixth on goal difference, Brabin concluded, "There are two sides to our game. There's the doggedness that doesn't want to concede goals and we've achieved that today, but there's also a good free-flowing footballing side that has goals in it, and we haven't lived up to that today.

"But I've told the lads that today has gone now and we have to focus on Tuesday."

The U's are next in action at home to newly-promoted Lewes FC on Tuesday 7th October at 7.45pm, and then at home to Weymouth on Saturday 11th October at 3pm.

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