LIAM Sercombe insisted fatigue was not a factor as he struggled to explain Oxford United’s performance in defeat to Accrington Stanley.

The home side led 1-0 at the break, but never looked comfortable playing into the wind during a wretched second half display at the Kassam Stadium.

Accrington levelled seconds after the restart and pinched all three points late on, despite having a man sent off.

On the balance of play, Sercombe admitted the U’s could have few complaints about the 2-1 scoreline.

He said: “They were the better side, they were working a lot harder and making it a lot harder for us to get a shot away and things like that.

“They had more chances than we did and that’s not a good sign.

“We are usually a team that creates a lot more than other teams and we have to get back to that.”

Last week U’s boss Michael Appleton spoke about ‘red flags’ being raised by the club’s medical department over the workload for some players in the squad.

The side are in the middle of playing seven games in 22 days but Sercombe, who made his 39th start of the season on Saturday, did not think it was a factor in successive home defeats.

He said: “There have been a lot of games, but we’re professional footballers, that’s our job.

“You can’t really say you’re tired.

“We get a lot of rest and at training we do things right.

“I can’t see that being the reason.

“We’ve just got to get back to how we started the season.

“We’ve put ourselves in a great position and given ourselves a massive opportunity. We need to pick ourselves up.”