Martin Ling felt most of his team were well below par in Tuesday's 2-0 defeat at Grays Athletic.

An even first half, in which both teams gifted possession and wasted chances, was followed by an equally poor second half, but it was Grays who found the net just before the hour and profited from the penalty spot in stoppage time to record only their second win of the season.

"It was a bad night at the office, you can't deny it," said the U's manager afterwards. "We didn't get ourselves going and the first half was a non-event. A couple of chances fell our way but we didn't impose ourselves on the game. They're a team that's playing without any confidence and we didn't make it difficult for them, and that's the result.

"You can't just turn up at a place and expect to get a result. You've got to earn the right and we didn't do that. When things are going well it's easy for players to stand up and be counted, when it's not going so well it's difficult.

"That's what I've said to them," he added. "I've laid into the team and a few of them as well and now we'll see who the real people are who will stand up against Histon on Sunday, which will prove to be a difficult game coming off the back of our last two results."

Ling had called for a reaction to Saturday's eventful 4-3 defeat at home to Luton on Saturday, and he was disappointed at the response; "You're always looking for a reaction from your team and looking for them to go and do a job, but today there weren't enough players on form.

"You need seven or eight players to be performing to their potential to win a game of football and we had nowhere near that number tonight. We never imposed ourselves or asked them any questions - their goalkeeper has made a couple of saves but not been stretched massively, and they got the result. They're fighting for their lives and they've got a new management team and they're going to be up and at it, and we weren't."

Chris Holroyd was United's best attacking outlet and both he and substitute Mark Beesley had a late chance to equalised with the score still at 1-0, and Ling reserved any praise for United's leading scorer: "Chrissy was our one bright spark and if anything was going to happen it was going to come from him. It hasn't happened for us tonight and we have to brush ourselves down and get on with it.

"People need to know their responsibilities in the team unit and not just go and do it individually, and I think we went a bit individual and not as a team unit," he added.

Ling handed Lee Phillips his first start of the season after recovering from a pre-season knee injury, and he admitted he is finding it hard to select a regular partner for the in-form Holroyd: "I brought Lee Phillips in because I thought it would be more of a physical game and looking at the pitch I thought we might need a physical presence up there.

"I keep switching the front men; Chris Holroyd is holding his position for obvious reasons, and the other three are mixing and matching between them. I don't think any of them are happy with playing a bit part but at the moment I've got to make the decision about which way I go."

On the late penalty, when Anthony Tonkin tangled with Richard Graham in the area but Wayne Hatswell was the U's man booked, Ling admitted, "I couldn't quite work it out, to be honest with you - it looked like their player fouled Tonkin and then they gave a penalty against Tonkin and booked Hatswell.

"I don't know if he booked Hatswell for a dissent reaction or because he thought it was Hatswell who made the foul, but it was the reserve referee in the second half and sometimes that shows."

Ling concluded by acknowledging that defeats in the last two games will overshadow the previous good run as United prepare for Sunday's match at Histon, who won tonight despite being reduced to ten men just before half-time: "It's back-to-back defeats now after eight games without defeat, and yet I read in the paper today that we've only won one in five, so statistics can change depending however you want to look at it but the performance tonight wasn't good enough."

Next Up

United are next in action at Histon on Sunday (2pm), which is all-ticket. The restriction will definitely not be lifted so there will be no pay on the day admittance. Tickets are on sale now [details].

[Match report] [Fixture list] [League table]

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