Leyton Orient head coach Justin Edinburgh said that his side “didn’t show enough quality” as they lost 1-0 at home to National League strugglers Maidenhead United.

Adrian Clifton scored the only goal of the game early in the second half to condemn the O’s to defeat, a loss that sees them drop to third in the table.

Speaking to the club’s website, Edinburgh said: “We can’t look at anyone else apart from ourselves today. We’ve come up short, we didn’t go and impose ourselves in the second half as we should have done and when we gave the goal away it was always going to be an uphill task.

“I thought made a little bit of a go at it but we didn’t show enough quality or play the way that we set up to do all week.”

Maidenhead came into the game 19th in the table, so Orient will have been expecting a win, but Edinburgh warned that no team is safe from a shock defeat.

He said: “I said to the players in there to not expect anyone to come here and roll over and have their bellies tickled or be fearful, this is people’s cup final. That’s no excuse for us, we’ve been together for over a year now, we know these types of teams will come here and make it difficult and we have to overcome it.

“Obviously, nerves are increasing, people start to get a little bit anxious, change their game but we’ve got to remain calm and composed and stay in the moment.”

The O’s squad saw Marvin Ekpiteta return to the bench after a spell out with injury, and Edinburgh said that he and the other players in the treatment room are coming back into contention and will be needed during the final run-in.

He said: “[James Dayton] came into training on Monday, obviously Marvin was back on the bench today, the two Josh’s are not far away in Coulson and Koroma, Jordan [Maguire-Drew] was back on the bench today.

“It comes at a very good time because we need the squad to be at its strongest and most competitive.”

Orient’s next game sees them travel to FA Trophy holder Brackley Town in the fourth round of this year’s edition of the competition, and Edinburgh is looking to field as strong a side as possible.

He said: “We’ll put the team out to win the game as we always do. It’s the quarter-final of a competition that we feel we’re in to try and win so we’ll be respectful.

“We know it’s going to be a tough game up against the holders so it’s going to be a tough game, but we’ll look to go and win it.”

The fixture against Brackley takes place next Saturday at their St James’ Park ground, with kick-off at 3pm.