Rob Smith: No faulting Bucks effort

Despite having ample opportunities and a seemingly good goal ruled out for offside, the Bucks fell to their second defeat in 72 hours. But unlike Saturday's white flag at Smith's former employers Hednesford Town, Smith admitted that he couldn't question the side's work-rate and effort.

He said: "It was a hammer blow. The commitment was there today and that's all you want from players.

"All I said on Saturday (after Hednesford) is that I wanted commitment from the players and they gave it in abundance.

"The result wasn't there but the commitment was and I think that even the supporters will appreciate that as long as we give that – then there's no real complaints.

"I'm disappointed that we lost but I can't really ask for any more from the players."

Telford are now six points from safety at the bottom of the National League North with 19 games remaining.

But Smith was pleased to see such a positive reaction from last Saturday's events at Keys Park – where he kept his side in the dressing room for an hour after the full-time whistle.

"We should go down

fighting. We didn't give

that on Saturday, myself and the players acknowledged that and we've had a talk about it and tried to put it right against Gloucester," the New Bucks Head chief said.

"Obviously we're massively disappointed with the result but I felt that we

deserved more from the game.

"It's a case of us being kicked while we're down. I thought that we had a goal from Dave Hibbert disallowed that was onside.

"We did everything but score and got done at the end but that's football.

"I was 100 per cent happy with what the players gave out there.

"If we'd have given it against Hednesford then we would've probably won, but we didn't give that commitment on Saturday.

"The supporters just want to see effort and I thought we gave that today. I don't see what more we could've done."