Adam Murray not too downbeat after Plymouth defeat, but '˜hated' touchline absence

The Stags boss, who watched from the directors box while serving a touchline ban, admitted Argyle were the better side today, but he wasn’t too downbeat.

“It was one of those days,” he said.

“Things didn’t go our way. Little decisions, bounces and turns of the ball, ricochets from corners.

“We’ve hit the crossbar and it hit the back of the keeper and falls to him.

“But they’re a good team. In the first half they opened us up a little bit.”

Murray said the context of the opposition and their quality meant he wouldn’t be dwelling on the defeat, that halted his side’s four match unbeaten run.

“I’m not too downhearted. This was a big test for us.

“They’re a few steps ahead of us in terms of their journey.

“We don’t get downhearted, we stay on our step, working hard.

“I felt the performance wasn’t that bad, we tried, worked hard and created problems but the bottom line is that x-factor. They showed it and we didn’t.

“We’ve had a good go, they were just better than us on the day.

“I wouldn’t say we write it off, we want to be in the top three ultimately, whether it’s next season or the season after, so we have to learn from it.

“But we move on quite quickly, we’ve got a lot of games coming up that we can go and win.

“We’re on a great run, we’ve lost a game of football against a top team.”

And he won’t be voluntarily swapping the dugout for the directors box again any time soon.

“I hated it,” he said.

“It’s horrendous, I don’t know how people do it.

“You feel a little bit out of control.”