TOWN boss Maurice Malpas admitted he would have to bolster his squad after Lee Peacock's straight red-card against Huddersfield.

The midfielder will miss three games and, with Michael Pook still sidelined through injury, Malpas will be forced to move in the loan market.

He admits he has already missed out on one target, believed to be Southend's Kevin Maher, but will be stepping up his search this week.

He said: "We are down to the bone in midfield now. I will have to step up my search in midfield.

"The person we did have in mind has not come. The deadline is at the end of this month and our problem now is we have to bring someone in on loan until the end of the season, clubs may not want to let their players go for that long.

"We got the three points and I think the game summed up our season in that it was good and then so bad.

Everything went right for the first half and not too much went right for the second half. That sums us up quite well.

"We spoke about the lack of consistency and that came to the front again.

"We battled away, it was backs to the wall stuff, but three points is all that matters.

"We will look at the positives. We scored three excellent goals. A couple of good crosses and Coxy has had a good chance.

"I thought their first penalty was soft and at half time I said just try and maintain it but you would think I had said the opposite.

"The ref gave the penalty against Miguel but I thought Lee Peacock got the ball.

"The linesman should have helped but we should have had the game sewn up.

"I am going to say the referee has got two decisions right. One is Billy Paynter's sending off and the other is Lee Peacock's.

"I have looked at the video and am big enough and brave enough to say Lee was slightly late.

"There was no malice but he deserved to get sent off.

I am sure the referee will have a better game than that. "There were a few iffy decisions from start to finish.

I would like to think the assessor's marks will be quite low because I will be giving him low marks that is for sure.

"Tomorrow morning it is an extra three points. We needed that because we don't want the gap to be any larger.

"I think the referee's performance was summed up by the fact both managers were perplexed by his decisions. He gave so many poor decisions in my mind it was a poor performance."