PEP Clotet felt for the travelling Oxford United fans after their impressive turnout at Blackpool witnessed the side’s worst performance of the season.

More than 1,600 supporters made the long journey to the Lancashire coast, but the 400-mile round trip quickly soured as two early goals for the hosts laid the platform for a 3-1 defeat.

While Clotet sought to stay balanced in his assessment of the performance, the U’s boss regretted his side were unable to give the Yellow Army more to shout about.

He said: “Obviously this is a bad game for us and we do feel very sorry for the fans – they deserve much better.

“I never conducted myself with extra confidence after the performances we had in the last week, so I’m not going to get the team down too much.

“It went this way today, we just have to put it right and try to play better against Walsall (next Saturday).”

Blackpool had won their previous six league games at home, but could not have expected the level of United’s generosity.

Kyle Vassell and Callum Cooke put them 2-0 up inside 16 minutes with efforts from outside the box, but the scoreline still flattered the visitors.

Clotet, who substituted Wes Thomas before the break and then changed the side’s formation for the second half, said: “The game was really thrown away in the first half, especially in the fact they scored early and they scored a second goal close as well broke completely our rhythm.

“It was hard for us to get back to our intensity and our game idea (plan) that we’ve been having in the last few weeks.”

He added: “The second half we wanted the game to break down and for it to be very open.

“In this way it was easier to show a much better performance in the second half.

“(But) I think we paid a really high price for those (goals) in the first half and actually the game went then.”