DORCHESTER Town player-manager Mark Jermyn was left frustrated by his side’s fragility at set-pieces as they lost their final pre-season game 2-0 to Poole Town at the Avenue.

The visitors’ goals came from a free-kick in the first half as Nico Zanchetta headed home whilst Luke Roberts turned in Abdulai Bell-Baggie’s corner with five minutes to play, after a raft of changes had been made.

The hosts’ attacking trio of Liam Sayers, Mario Mateus and Ben Wood caused problems for the Dolphins’ defence, but struggled to find the breakthrough.

Speaking about the game, Jermyn told Echosport: “I was happy with the majority of it (the performance) but I was disappointed about the way that we conceded the two goals.

“They couldn’t be much easier. We should have defended our line better on the first one and, with the second, the man has left the front post. I have no idea why.

“But, we gave a much better account of ourselves than we did at Wimborne so I’m more than happy with our performance.

“We faded towards the end of the game, but given the quality of their substitutes they brought, it was always going to impact on the game.”

Try as they might, the Magpies struggled to break down an organised visiting defence. However the manager is not worried about his side’s lack of goals.

He added: “We’ve been without Mario and Ben for much of pre-season and they are here to score goals.

“Mario scored one against Wimborne and Liam also scored and the teams we have played are good sides.

“I think once the season starts we will be okay goals-wise. We have quite a few quick players and there were a couple of occasions where we did get behind them (Poole Town) and I think against sides where we need to take points, we can impose ourselves and make sure we get those three points on the board.”

Sayers agreed terms before the game with the Magpies, but Jermyn feels his squad will need to be bolstered before the start of the season.

He explained: “We need to speak to a couple of clubs this week as we need to get some loan players in because we are desperately thin.

“We have a couple of players that we have our eye on from the clubs that we have played so we need to touch base with them and see if we can get them in.”

Chris Dillon was the only first team player that missed out in the loss and his thigh injury will be monitored before the Kettering game on Saturday.

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