A disappointed Ben Strevens pointed to a theme of conceding late goals this season as to why his Dagenham & Redbridge side succumbed to a 2-0 home defeat to York City on Saturday.

The Daggers boss showed clear frustration in his post-match interview with the club website after Lenell John-Lewis and Ollie Pearce secured the points for the away side.

“I’m disappointed, obviously. It’s a disappointing result. I think it was 79th minute they’ve scored. It’s been a theme,” said Strevens.

“There wasn’t any trying to sit back in that moment or anything like that, but it’s been a theme in the early part of the season where today it was 0-0, but in other games we’ve obviously been ahead and conceded late.

"The two games we’ve lost now, Woking and today, have both been in that sort of time in the game, so it’s something we’re certainly going to need to look into.

“The goal at the end, I take the full blame for that goal. I’d rather try and go for it and get the equaliser by putting bodies in the box, so I have to take the blame for the second goal.

"All in all, losing at home is disappointing for all of us, and we certainly felt that after the game, and everyone inside the stadium felt the same as well.”

Recent signing Tim Akinola came on at half-time to replace Shiloh Remy as Strevens looked to inject some more attacking potency into the side.

But the Daggers boss felt the collective didn’t offer enough to turn the momentum on its head.

“He did some good bits, and he did some bits where he needs to get a bit sharper. That’s not just him, but all the boys,” Strevens added.

“He had a couple of days of training, and I was mulling over whether to start him in the game or not.

“I chose to go with Junior [Morias] as the more advanced one with [Josh] Rees a little bit deeper. But I wasn’t overly happy with the first-half performance, so I made a couple of changes.

"PK [Paul Kalambayi] got booked extremely early in the game, and we were still having to defend one-v-one in some moments, and we just didn’t get Shiloh in the game enough and give him the ball enough.

“He had a real good pre-season and was positive as well last week at Southend, so I feel I had to make that change at half-time to try and do things slightly differently.

"I thought the second half we started quite bright. There was a massive break in play, which is nobody’s fault, but the linesman got injured, and the momentum we had gained at the start of that second half, without really being at our best, was certainly rising, I felt.

“Then we went a little bit flat, which isn’t an excuse. I’m not trying to give them an excuse, but the momentum we had at the start of the second half seemed to go away at that point."

Daggers will hope to bounce back from an inconsistent start to their National League campaign when they visit Maidenhead United on Saturday (3pm).

Sutton United are the visitors to Victoria Road next Tuesday (September 10, 7.45pm).