Morpeth Town midfielder Liam Noble remained upbeat after his side’s FA Cup exit at National League North side Southport.
The Highwaymen led through Liam Henderson’s header, before conceding in the 59th and 80th minutes as they slipped to a narrow loss.
“It is a bit disappointing to be honest,” he told the club website.
“We had chances at 1-0 up, not just the penalty, and we need to take them. We’ve come and given a great account of ourselves, especially in the first half when I thought we played well.
“Second half, we got stuck into the scrap with them which we didn’t want to do. We conceded two sloppy goals on our behalf; it happens.
“But to come to the team in the league above, I thought we gave a real good account of ourselves. We need to focus on the positives; we’ve taken them right to the end and definitely deserved a draw but we didn’t take our chances.
“We need to bounce back in a tough game with FC United of Manchester.”
Noble felt the end result didn’t reflect how the game unfolded.
“I think everyone played well, especially the back two – Jeff (Henderson) and Mickey (Turner) – apart from the two goals,” he added.
“We can’t fault anyone’s efforts, it’s just the sloppiness of the goals and we need to be putting them away at the other end. If you look at the highlights, we had more than enough chances to put this game to bed.”
