Tis: Performance was not good enough
‘Not good enough’ were the words of City boss Paul Tisdale following his side’s 2-1 home defeat to Cambridge United on Saturday.
The Grecians began the afternoon one place above their opponents and unbeaten in their last three matches, but it was the visitors who were quickest out of the traps in the Devonshire sunshine.
With the game still in its infancy, a mix up between Christy Pym and Luke Croll allowed Luke Berry to muscle in and fire his side in front, and it got worse two minutes later as Harrison Dunk hit one on the turn to double the visitors’ advantage.
Joel Grant’s stooping header gave City a second-half lifeline, but speaking after the game Tis provided a damning assessment of his side’s performance: “For the first in a long time I feel that we were below par in terms of brightness, speed to the ball and commitment to play. We’ve lost 2-1 and I don’t think we deserved anything from it.
“Conceding the first goal so early puts you in a very negative position,” said Tis. “The worst thing is we had the opportunity to clear our lines but made a complete hash of it. It’s one thing going behind but we had total control of the situation and we dealt with it very poorly. Those things happen in football but I think it was symptomatic of the opening ten minutes. We were too dull in how we started the game and we didn’t deserve anything from that first half. The second goal makes it even worse. We rallied after the break, but when you give a team two goals it makes it a very, very hard task.
With Jake Taylor suspended and Ryan Harley and Jordan Tillson sidelined with injuries City were struggling for bodies in the centre of the park, but Tis refused to on as a reason for defeat: “We had one or two players who had to come out of the side today but the players that go in have a responsibility to pick up the mantle and they weren’t good enough. The game’s finished and we move onto next week.”
City make the long trip north to Morecambe next week. They will be looking to re-find the form that saw them run out such convincing winners at The Hive last time they were on their travels.