Opposition view: Unhappy Wellens slams 'diabolical' and 'shambolic' Leyton Orient after defeat to Cobblers
Leyton Orient manager Richie Wellens was heavily critical of his players after Saturday’s 1-0 defeat to Northampton, accusing them of ‘letting the fans down’ after a ‘diabolical’ second half performance.
Orient were the better side in the first half and Daniel Agyei missed two good chances to give them the lead, but it was a totally different story after the break.
Cameron McGeehan opened the scoring within three minutes of the restart and Orient failed to muster any kind of response on their way to a tame away defeat, one which drops them below the Cobblers in the table.
"I thought we were good in the first half and should have been two or three up," said Wellens. "We missed an open goal and there's another one where we hit the man on the line.
"But we don't take our chances and the second half was diabolical right from kick-off. We made poor decisions, the intensity was poor, the body language was poor and the quality was poor.
"They've had one shot on target and how we've only had a couple of shots on target given some of the areas we found I don't know. I think we put over 50 crosses into the box and none of our three strikers won a first contact.
"The game changes if we go 1-0 up but at the moment we are not scoring when we are on top. It then becomes a bit shambolic at the end and I should never have to change shape and I should never be making five subs.
"We went from a performance where we should have been two or three goals ahead in the first half to a performance in the second half where we were so bad that Northampton deserved to win.
"The players need to wake up. What I've said to you is no different than to what I've said to the players. It was diabolical in the second half and we let the fans down. We looked like a young, naive, inexperienced team."