Jim Smith says that he and his fellow coaching staff at Oxford United will be doing everything they can to stop the rot after Thursday night's shock defeat at Histon.

And the U's boss doesn't blame supporters who were upset about the performance as the U's embarrassingly crashed 1-0 at the Glassworld Stadium.

It was the first time United have slipped to back-to-back league defeats since they dropped back into Non- League football.

Smith, who has been U's boss for 18 months in his second spell with the club, knows many fans are now questioning whether he's got what it takes to produce a promotion-winning team this season.

But the 66-year-old says that he is more concerned about how United are playing than supporters calling for his head.

"You don't have to worry about what's being said, but you worry about the performance of the players," he stressed.

"That's my job, and everybody else in and around the club . . . to make sure we stop the rot.

"A win at Histon, which we expected, would have made a major difference to the league, but we've put ourselves in trouble and we've got to get out of it.

"We've got two home games coming up now and we've got to win both of them.

"I think fans should be unhappy. You can play well and lose and fans will appreciate that, but they won't accept that kind of perfor- mance.

"For whatever reason we picked Thursday to produce our worst display.

"And that's very hard for a manager to answer - why did they do that?

"It's incredible to think that, with the quality and experience of the players we've got, that they appeared to be scared of the ball."