CAMBRIDGE United boss Shaun Derry felt his side should have departed Wiltshire with something to show for their efforts despite admitting they had slipped below their own recent high standards at the Energy Check County Ground today.

The U's enjoyed the bulk of first-half possession but, despite sporadically dangerous moments, shipped an early goal to Keshi Anderson and, despite hitting the woodwork in the second period, saw their fate sealed by substitute Harry Smith's late finish in Swindon Town's 2-0 win.

The visitors had won three out of their previous four games, including dispatching Forest Green Rovers 3-0 in midweek, but were unable to seriously work Town keeper Lawrence Vigouroux, whose goal was only seriously threatened by Uche Ikpeazu second-period header that hit the crossbar.

“What disappoints me more than anything was the standards that we hit on Tuesday weren’t the same today,” Derry told the Cambridge News.

“It’s all well and good taking the accolades and acclaim on a fantastic win on Tuesday (against Forest Green) but I was expecting us to go on the front foot more this afternoon and not concede the goals we conceded.

“There’s no hiding place and that’s what I said to the players. We’ve all got aspirations to kick on and we’ve got aspirations to work at the highest level.

“When you see the consistency we’ve shown for large part of the season, you can see we were off it today.

“Even though we didn’t hit the highs we did on Tuesday night, we still should have gotten something out of the game.”

Derry added: “I think if there was one overriding disappointment it was that killer pass, that clinical pass at certain points.

“If you don’t (score) and you come away and draw 0-0 you go onto the next game and you’ve took four points out of the two games (against Rovers and Swindon) but we didn’t.

“We’re up and down at the minutes in terms of results and that’s disappointing.”