Peterborough United boss blames ‘avoidable’ errors rather than a disrupted preparation for defeat by Sheffield United

Posh were without several first-team regulars for the televised Championship contest which was deservedly won by the Blades with second-half goals from Billy Sharp and Posh substitute Callum Morton.

Ferguson was frustrated again by the concession of two ‘avoidable’ goals which left Posh stuck in the relegation zone two points adrift of Reading, albeit with a game in hand.

“This league is unforgiving,” Ferguson said. “We know that by now. Mistakes made are usually punished and both goals were avoidable. The first one we just have to clear it out of the box, but we don’t and Billy Sharp pounced. We know we can’t give him a chance like that.

“And the second one came from a corner we didn’t defend well enough. We are very naive with our defending.

“It was always going to be difficult against very good opposition, but we don’t help ourselves. We just have to find a a way of conceding sloppy goals.

“We also could have scored first as Johnson Clarke-Harris had a great chance. I’m not blaming Johnno as the goalkeeper made a good save, but these are big moments for us in a game like this. If we score first our confidence grows and the game opens up for us. We had a four-on-three break at the start of the second-half, just like our opening goal at Birmingham, but we made a poor decision this time.

“They dominated the ball in the first-half without really carving us open, but we had to be better on the ball ourselves.

“Kwame Poku again showed a lot of promise and I was pleased with Jeando Fuchs’ debut. I didn’t want to throw him straight in after a whirlwind 48 hours for him, but when Mark Beevers failed his fitness test I had to drop Josh Knight into the back three and play Jeando. He did fine.”

Beevers, Jack Taylor, Harrison Burrows, Oliver Norburn, Siriki Dembele and Ronnie Edwards all missed the game because of injury.