Dons remain outside of the top six with their fifth league defeat in the first 10 Premiership matches of the season

Stephen Robinson admits Aberdeen's 3-2 loss to Dundee United at Tannadice is a hard one to swallow.

The Dons missed out on the chance to leapfrog their opponents into the top six with their fifth Premiership loss in 10 matches this season. They had fought back from a goal twice to level things up again thanks to efforts from Nesta Guiness-Walker and Connor Ronan but ultimately came away with nothing after Zac Sapsford's header 18 minutes from time.

Sections of the Pittodrie fanbase continue to call for the Irishman to be removed from his post, with the Reds hosting Falkirk in the league on Wednesday before squaring off against Rangers in the semi finals of the Premier Sports Cup semi final.

Robinson was pleased with his side's attacking endeavour at Tannadice but concedes their slack play at the other end cost them badly.

Speaking to BBC Radio Scotland, he said: "It's hard to take because I thought we deserved something out of the game. Some of our play going forward was very good, but we concede three goals away from home.

"Those goals were really disappointing and I'm not going to hide away from that. You don't win games when you concede three away from home.

"We need to manage the game better at 2-2, we were very cavalier. Ultimately that's my fault. We didn't defend well in key moments and that's difficult to take because there's a lot of good stuff.

"We've got a squad decimated with injuries and viruses, we have three centre-halves out. It's a difficult place at the moment, there's people playing who shouldn't be on the pitch and boys on the bench that shouldn't be.

"It is what it is. It's not an excuse, it's a fact. We scored two very good goals away from home, you have to come away with at least a point but we didn't do that."

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