In the wake of Saturday's 2-0 defeat at home to Barrow, Dan Gleeson spoke passionately about the circumstances at Cambridge United and pointed to Tuesday's match as a welcome opportunity to put things right.

"At the start I thought we were a little sloppy, maybe because of the heat, but as the game went on we got into it and created a couple of chances," he said. "We had fair shouts for two penalties too, but our luck doesn't seem to be in at the moment."

The right-back, who was one of the players denied by goalkeeper Stuart Tomlinson when his long-range piledriver was clawed over in the second half, praised Barrow for an open game until they took the lead early in the second half.

"To give Barrow credit they weren't like a lot of sides that have come here and played for a draw," he said. "They tried to attack us and had one good chance in the first half but by the break we were the better side. But we gave a sloppy goal away - the move that led up to free kick should have been cut out a lot further down the pitch.

"That said it was an unbelievable free kick, good enough to win any match, and after we conceded Barrow had a completely different game plan. It was like a lot of teams last year from that point onwards - everyone behind the ball and trying to hit us as we push forward. For us to break that down it's got to be either an individual bit of brilliance or a bit of luck, and we had neither."

United had chances to level after Carlos Logan's free kick and were still in with a chance of levelling the game until referee Stephen Martin, who had denied United more than one penalty, awarded Barrow a spot kick in the 90th minute when the ball bounced up against Josh Coulson's hand.

"You can't argue with the penalty for the second goal," said Gleeson. "Josh had his hands raised and they are always going to get given."

But he was keen to stand up for his young team-mate, and added, "The blame can't only be put on Josh; he was left one on one with us chasing the game. He's young, he's learning the game and he's a great player, so if anyone says he cost us the game they're wrong because we cost ourselves the game before that.

"Josh has been given a lot of stick as well," he continued. "Different managers have come in and had different opinions on him so it's been hard on him. In any walk of life, it's not easy to sit on the sidelines watching someone else do a job and just having to step in every now and then, and that's no different in football.

"Josh is a very good talent; unfortunately he's given the penalty away but people forget he's young and learning and he will learn from that and go on and continue to improve."

Amidst the off-field distractions of a club that lost its manager and chairman last week, Cambridge-born Gleeson feels everyone needs to stick together and focus on Tuesday's match at Ebbsfleet United.

"People keep going on about what is happening off the pitch, but the only people that can change what is going on at the minute is us on the pitch and we have to stick together.

"We've lost two-nil to Barrow but we gave everything out there and we have enough talent at this football club to win any game of football. Sometimes it won't happen for us; that's football. But it's a good thing that we have the game on Tuesday and we can immediately set about putting right the result from Saturday."

[Match report] [Fixture list]

You are respectfully reminded that any article, as with all content on this website, unless otherwise stated, is subject to copyright © and the Official Cambridge United Website must be acknowledged as the original source including all quotes.

AT090810 web@cambridge-united.co.uk