It’s frustration all round for players and fans alike as the team finds itself in a little slump after what had been an excellent run of results.
“Unfortunately it all started with a really poor performance away at Barrow,” manager Paul Simpson explained. “You can’t afford to do it. You can’t take your foot off the gas, you’ve got to keep doing the good things.
“We had a poor performance at Barrow, we had a really strong performance in the second half with ten men on Saturday, but we didn’t get anything to show for that. At Stockport the performance wasn’t at the level we want, and the truth is we got what we deserved out of it.
“I’ve told the players they simply can’t afford to start games like they did here. You can’t keep giving teams a leg up. You definitely can’t do that for strong sides.
“One thing I have said is that we’re now in a situation where we have to dig in and work together. Whatever work ethic everybody has had, we need to find it again.
“We have to keep level heads, keep going and make sure we don’t disappear off into little cliques. We stick together and hopefully it’ll turn for us soon.
“I think when you have a positive momentum, you go into games really believing and carry it on. When you have that negative one it’s hard to break it, and we’ve got to break it because the danger is that we slip into it.
“I’ve said this before, I didn’t think we were as good a team as everybody was starting to talk about, I thought everybody was getting a bit excited talking about play-offs. We’re not at that stage yet.
“We’re still scrapping to make sure we’re a top half of the table team. That’s what we’ve got to try and do. If we can get a bit of luck, and not be as unlucky as we have been with injuries so far, then we might be able to go even better.
“But we’re still a long way from that. We’re certainly a long way from the group they’ve assembled at Stockport County, and we’ve got to try and work to achieve that at some point.”
The standout performance of the night came from the stands, with 1,116 United fans there to cheer their team on, even when it wasn’t going their way.
“It’s magnificent,” he said. “That’s why I took the players over there for the huddle, because the changing rooms are very small here. I wanted to get my message to them before we got inside.
“I did that, then I said to them that they had to make sure they turned round to thank the fans. They came here, they stuck with us, they made a noise and they kept encouraging us.
“They even stayed at the end even though we didn’t give them a hell of a lot to cheer about. We gave them a bit more in the second half, but I’m really disappointed that we’ve given them nothing to take up the road.
“We talk about them every game, home and away, because they’ve been magnificent. When you’ve had a result and performance like that, you can’t have a big inquest, it’s more about reviewing.
“We’ll pick up on Thursday and talk about what we need to do differently and better. But I wanted the players all as a group, and staff, together to show their appreciation, because that is magnificent support for us.
“Like I say, we’re in a bit of a rut at the moment, that’s now three games, three defeats, starting with a poor performance at Barrow that let us all down.
“All of us got let down on that night, it’s not a case of the players, it’s us as a group. We have to do everything we possibly can to try and turn it around.
“It was a win at home on the first game of the season that started it, now we have to make sure we get a win as soon as we possibly can to get the next one going.
“It’s really disappointing we’re on this run. The level of performance at Barrow that started this run wasn’t acceptable.
“We then haven’t started well against Stockport, and we have to get back to doing what we were doing – believing, working, demanding higher standards from each other that hopefully in turn will get results.
“I thought we threatened to get ourselves back in it in the second half on Tuesday, we got into some good areas, some good opportunities, we just didn’t do enough.
“That was the top and bottom of it, we didn’t do enough to get ourselves the result. We certainly didn’t perform at the level we’re capable of, there’s no denying that. Stockport ran harder, stronger, together, and we did it in dribs and drabs, but certainly not enough.
“Now it’s literally the case that we have to stick together, dig deep and get ourselves out of this.”