Hereford FC manager Josh Gowling said he was disappointed after a 1-0 defeat at league leaders Brackley this afternoon.
The only goal of the game came mid-way in the second half. Perhaps more worrying for Gowling was that both Luke Haines with an injury and Krystian Pearce with a straight red card had to leave the pitch.
"Disappointed," said Gowling.
"I know we've had a lay-off but I thought for a large part of that game we were the better team.
"They came strong towards the middle of the second half. We would have liked to change things but we've had a couple of lads call in today sick (Ismail and Kouhyar). So we couldn't change to give us a bit of impetus.
"Frustrated, very frustrated."
Brackley keeper Danny Lewis made a couple of good saves.
"Goalies make saves because you don't put the balls in the corners, simple as that. Ryan had one in the first half where if he gambles back post he taps it in. Jaanai had one second half if he gambles back post he taps in.
"And then we've had some good opportunities where we've got in the final third and, I've let them know, we don't take care and attention with the pass.
"They are top of the league and they are a good side but for me you take at least a point away from this game and we've not done it.
"I think we played well, we dominated the first half.
"There was a period in the second half which I've told them I wasn't happy with because they got on top a little bit and then all of a sudden our wide players stopped tracking back, our midfielders didn't latch onto our back four which I wasn't happy with. We got to grips with it eventually and started doing it."
Pearce had a good game until he was red carded for a bad challenge. What did Gowling make of that?
"I actually wasn't looking. I know this is like Wenger but I don't know. People told me it was a red but it's not great is it.
"He's our senior pro, you expect him to stand up.
"I think he got frustrated because the balls come over and he's had a bad touch.
"Is it three or one game, I don't know.
"Luke has pulled his calf today as well.
"We're done to bare bones. We've had Toby and two youth team players on the bench and now we've lost Luke and Christian."
Three regular players were missing today - Hodgkiss, Ismail and Kouhyar.
"Jarred hurt his knee in training before Christmas so we're working on that to get him back but I thought Dinesh for his debut was absolutely excellent, got forward well, good deliveries in the box so I was really pleased to see Dinesh in.
"Zeli has had a little niggle and is not feeling great, Owen didn't train Thursday as he was not feeling well and Maziar rang up this morning feeling sick. Mazi was due to start today and so we had to re-jig things around because he wasn't in the team."
Was any of that Covid related?
"We'll find out when they do a test is my answer. No idea. There is flu going around as well so you just don't know. Hopefully he got a bit of flu and he's not feeling well. Krystian was not feeling great but he did a test and he's fine.
"We're just barebones at the moment. And a game like today where you want to tweak things and change things around, you just don't have the squad to do it.
"Fozi has come on and done well but I'm not expecting a lot from him when he's not played or trained that much in eight or nine weeks."
How can you consistantly put a competitive team out against top sides?
"We'll always be competitive or we'll find a way of being competitive. That's my job as a manager to be competitve in every game we play so if we haven't got the numbers, we haven't got the numbers.
"What I would say is I spoke in the week about the budget and fans not coming in. There was no blame on the fans by the way. What we were trying to say was the reality of the Covid situation is that for everyone so I just want to make that clear that the football club is not blaming the fans for any of that.
"It is what it is. We'll keep working.
"We've got some good young lads that we can bring in, so we'll do that. But hopefully Luke is not too bad and Mazi and Zeli will be back in the next couple of weeks.
"We've got some good links to football clubs. We'll be asking them to do us a favour, I would say.
"We've got a few targets we're looking at now so hopefully we can bring them in for the Gateshead game and bolster the side.
"We haven't got a left back for a start, probably need another midfielder now and a centre half so that what we'll be looking at."