They were the first words uttered by shell-shocked forwards coach Dave Harrison after witnessing Halifax's latest debacle which has seen them remain without a point after six matches in National Three (North).

A lack of punch, passion and pride – qualities Halifax teams have thrived on through the years – were sadly lacking as they surrendered to a highly-motivated, talented and quick young Loughborough Students side who were far more up for this game than their hosts.

And it was the absence of any real fight that left Harrison and head coach Rhys Morgan seething.

"Everybody can have an off day, that is to be expected, but when it happens as a team that is very hard to take," said Harrison.

"Other than Oli Marns, who was a real shining star, the other lads just didn't perform.

"The only positive to draw from the game is that surely it cannot get any worse. We are at the bottom and so the only way has to be up."

Harrison and Morgan prepared the team as meticulously as ever and the fact that the players deviated from the game plan was an obvious area of frustration.

"The players have got to get what's between their ears sorted out, because, on that performance, we aren't going anywhere," added Harrison.

"The key thing was that we were playing a student side. We knew they were going to be quick, we knew they were going to be fit.

"The important thing for us was that we needed to buy into how we wanted to play and that was to get them by the throat, squeeze them and get them into the corners and stifle them.

"Instead, especially in the first half, we tried to play rugby against them and they were always going to beat us at that.

"We showed that when we did play the ball into the corners it could work because we scored two tries.

"We didn't do that enough. And I make no apologies by saying if we had to play 10 man rugby and adopt the most boring game plan in order to win the game then that is what we should have done.

"You have to approach each game with a different plan and unfortunately the guys didn't buy into today for whatever reason and instead we just played into their hands."

Harrison also believed that a collective reluctance to take responsibility is hitting confidence.

"Rugby's a tough game physically and mentally and I thought that when we went behind players' heads went down," he said.

"That is a lack of bottle and that is unacceptable."