North Wales Crusaders head coach Anthony Murray was left 'disappointed and frustrated' by his side’s 50-6 defeat at play-off chasing Oldham.

The positivity of a spirited win at Newcastle a week earlier evaporated as the Roughyeds continually punished the Cru's frequent handling errors and high penalty count.

Serving a one match penalty notice for using foul and abusive language towards a match official in their previous game, Murray cut a frustrated figure in the stands during the defeat in which his side struggled from the outset.

He said: "There was knock-on from our first play of the afternoon, which set the tone really because we got even worse from there.

“We’ve gone to Newcastle last week and got a great result and really worked hard but have then come away to Oldham and put in a performance like that,

“Oldham are fighting towards the top of this league and they deserve to be there because they are a very good team, but sometimes you look at a defeat and the way in which you lose.

“Nobody likes losing but if you’ve given a good account of yourself then you can take it, but I’m really disappointed with the performance today.

“I’ve coached here for a long time and I’m really disappointed with the result here. We couldn't cope with Oldham's big pack and didn't have enough possession to hurt them at any point in the game really."

An 11th defeat of the campaign leaves the Cru lying in 10th place and their hopes of securing a play-off place looking increasingly remote.

Achieving back-to back league victories has proved difficult for the Wrexham club this term, and has hamstrung their efforts of breaking into the top half of the table.

Murray admits that the club's erratic league form has frustrated him and has called for his players to adopt a more ruthless mindset in their remaining games.

“You look to build momentum, and coming off the back of last week we had a chance to do that going into a tough run of games.

“I don’t know if some have been happy to go to Newcastle and get the win and then thought lets see what happens next, but that’s not good enough – we need to become a little bit more ruthless.

“We need to show that we can back up a good result, and I keep saying it but I’m just really disappointed with the manner in which we’ve lost today.

“Despite the result I wouldn’t say that Oldham were miles better than us, but what we did was give them a lot from penalties and errors, and if you give things away to good sides then they’ll punish you and that’s what has happened.

“Our completion rate was really poor once again and we needed to run a bit harder and tackle a bit harder.

“I’ll go away and review this game, I’ll pick it to pieces and I’ll need to make some changes, that’s quite clear."