Ryan Clarke says Satur-day’s 3-0 FA Cup defeat at Sheffield United – and especially the manner of it – will be a real eye-opener for many of the Oxford United squad.

“We didn’t push ourselves enough,” claimed the keeper.

“I don’t know why, maybe it was a real off-day, but Sheffield United deserved the win. We have to look at them and see what we need to do to step up a level.

“You have got lads there who are on big money and they wanted to do everything they could to get the ball back.

“We have done that for the majority of the season, just didn’t do it on Saturday.”

This was the United’s third straight defeat, but while there was legitimate reasons behind the back-to-back losses against Southend, the weekend reverse was hard to take, with the U’s putting in a poor display.

And Clarke says that with a trip to high-flying Crawley coming up this Saturday, they must regroup and get back into their old routine.

“We need to up our game from Saturday, that’s for sure,” Clarke added.

“We have to put things right very quickly, because we were not good.

“We should be relishing those sort of games, going to grounds like that, because if we do get it right and go up, these will be the sort of places we will be coming to.”