Darrell Clarke again bemoaned his side’s lack of quality on the ball, as well as the defending for the opening goal, as Barnsley lost 2-0 at Huddersfield Town on Saturday.

Ben Wiles scored after 83 minutes then David Kasumu netted right at the end for the home side managed by former Reds boss Michael Duff.

Clarke told the Chronicle: “I have been saying on repeat for two or three weeks that we haven’t been at the levels we need to be at. There wasn’t a lot in the game, in the first half our ‘keeper made a couple of saves then the second half was more even. We had a great chance with Sam (Cosgrove) but were punished with a really sloppy goal for 1-0.

“We have to defend the one, two better and we have to be picking up in the box. It’s a good finish but defensively not good enough. We defended pretty well other than that.”

Clarke again was frustrated with his side’s play on the ball, while they only had one shot on target. He said: “We were very loose on transition - ten yard passes going out of play. We’re not looking after it.

“The quality has to be a lot better. We didn’t have enough chances because we didn’t control the game enough. When we don’t mix our game up and take accountability we don’t get enough attacking flows.”

Barnsley now do not play a league game for two weeks. Clarke said: “We, not just my players but myself and staff, have to look in mirror and make sure we get it right. We don’t have a league game for a couple of weeks. We will do a lot of hard work on the training pitch. They are a good group to manage but we need more from them.”

Captain Luca Connell said: “We haven’t been looking after the ball well enough. It’s hard to say why. We have to raise the standards on the pitch. We will be working on that in training

“We want the fans to back us but we have to make sure we are giving them something more. We didn’t today - maybe for little spells but it needs to be more often.”

Duff said: “We were good value. We were the dominant team against a good team. At 0-0 it was a bit of a worry, thinking we have missed opportunities. The most pleasing part is we didn’t panic when Barnsley had ten or 15 minutes spell but we stuck to task.

“We picked the most energetic team we would pick because though that, with our quality, would hurt them.”