City of Liverpool manager Michael Ellison was left frustrated as his side suffered defeat in their first home match of the campaign against Skelmersdale United.
It marked back-to-back defeats after they failed to beat Glossop North End on Saturday.
Unlike at the weekend, the Purps took the lead when captain Nathan Burke broke the deadlock with a moment of individual quality when his effort arrow into the bottom corner.
However, two goals in five minutes from Skem, in the latter stages of the contest, was enough for the visitors to take all three points.
But an exasperated Purps boss felt his side didn’t deserve to be empty-handed, reflecting on the defeat, he told Off The Park: “Certainly not the result we wanted, I’ve just said in there I don’t think we deserved to lose the game.
“Like I’ve said, if you don’t take your chances or put them away you’re susceptible to conceding and that’s the way it was,” he added discussing the gut-wrenching defeat.
“I thought they were two poor goals, obviously a mistake from Ry (Ryan Hamer), he’s a young ‘keeper, he’s been outstanding for us, he’s come, dropped it and they’ve capitalised – a mistake, you can’t legislate for that.
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“The second one, I don’t think it was a pen, have to watch it back, to me it looked like it hit him in the stomach but his hands are by his side anyway – I think it’s harsh if he’s giving that. But he’s give it, they scored it and we’ve had a guilt-edged chance after that, I think it’s an open net and he’s shanked it wide.
“I think we should’ve got something out of the game and credit to them, the second half they changed their shape and put it on us, caused us a few more problems. Not a good night at the office.”
Despite the defeat, Ellison took positives from the performances. Noticing an improvement from their opening day defeat to Glossop, he added: “I think we deserved something from the game, I think even Saturday’s game we had chances, missed a penalty, we missed a one-v-one and on Saturday, I thought our application was poor and it wasn’t today. I thought they put a shift in, a derby they worked hard as well.
“We knew it was going to be tough but I thought we played some good stuff first half, but there’s no point being pleasing on the eye if you’re not going to take your chances – that final bits got to come.
“There’s stuff we can work on, there’s stuff we will work on but there’s no magic wand or magical thing we can do tactically, we done a lot of things right, we just have to take our chances and if we do that it obviously takes the pressure off later in the game when you’re defending.
After a far from ideal start to the campaign, Ellison is looking for a sharp improvement. On his teamtalk after the defeat, he added: “It’s difficult because I spoke to Macca (Paul McNally) in there and he was saying in the first-half you were outstanding but we don’t want to be that team that is pleasing on the eye and plays lovely football but doesn’t win the game.
“Ultimately, it’s about getting results, we want to have a type of way we play but I think it’s important we stick to what we believe in. I don’t think you can start panicking and go too far away from things.
“Like I say, the application was there tonight, for large parts of the game I thought we were the better side but the second half got a bit open for me when we scored the goal, we dropped a little bit deep and there was just too much space in the middle of the park.
“We’ll certainly improve, we’ll have to, we’ll have to do what we’re doing and hopefully turn defeats into wins.
Continuing on the positives of City of Liverpool’s performance, Ellison reflected: “We’re a bit thing on application and applying yourself. We know we’re going to be able to play footy here, the pitch is outstanding, we’ve got to find a way away from home when the pitches aren’t good we’ve still got to compete and find a way of grinding results out.
“The disappointing thing for me today is that goal, we got ourselves in front, haven’t been our best in the final third and you think okay, just relax take the sting out the game but it just got a bit hectic for me.
“Having to bring Glenn (Rule) off with a knock didn’t help, he just calmed things down there. It’s a better performance than Saturday but ultimately it’s the same result, we got no points for it and that’s going to have improve sharpish.”
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