Dartford player-boss Ben Greenhalgh has admitted his team has lost their “effectiveness”.

The Darts have conceded nine goals in their last three games ahead of tonight’s (Tuesday) trip to Lewes in Isthmian Premier.

After a solid start to the campaign and an excellent September, the Darts lost their momentum in October.

“We're not quite there as a team, where we were at the start of the season,” said Greenhalgh.

“The biggest thing that's been going through my head is we weren't very good for the first three games.

“But we scored five set pieces out of the six goals and we got nine points in three games. We were effective and we were together as a group. We then built on it in September.

“I think we've now lost our effectiveness. It is losing leaders, that’s a big issue. There's no denying that. But we've lost our effectiveness and our compactness as a squad.

“We're definitely going to have to go back to that a little bit.”

While Greenhalgh won’t use the absences of defenders Sam Odaudu, Ben Swift and Joe Tennent as an excuse, they are clearly a key factor.

George Whitefield was suspended against Aveley at the weekend while Vladimir Paternoster was injured, meaning Tennent made his first league outing since August.

Reflecting on their defensive frailties in the 4-3 loss at Aveley, Greenhalgh said: “It's naivety as a team, accepting to be one-on-one when you don't want to be one-on-one, or diving in so eager to win the ball and then suddenly you've lost your man.

“There were a lot of moments like that and it is about experience, we know that.

“The boys are fighting for the cause, but probably the fight isn't quite there, or they haven't quite got the fight in them at the moment with the games we've asked them to play.

“It's hard not to use it as an excuse because when you keep losing these senior players or having to play them when they're not quite right, it's always a big loss.

“When you look at it from a management perspective, we were deep down quite worried coming into a few games.

“We still were positive with the team that we've got, but there is a worry to it because you move to a back four, when we’ve had a back three all season. But we've had to go to a back four because we've only got two centre-halves available, and one of them was not quite fit.

“You lose another centre-half before the game. It's having to deal with it. I think Joe came in and dealt with it really well, but as a group I don't think we dealt with the changes well enough.

“That's the mentality that we've got to get out of the boys. No matter what the case, no matter what the scenario, we've got to fight and stay in the game.

“There's been certain fight, but it's been too open. Yes, it might be entertaining on some levels, but we're not here to be an entertaining team. We're here to be a winning team.

“But that's football at the moment, we have conceded too many goals in October.”

Dartford were seemingly sidetracked by referee Tommy Breen during their defeat at the weekend.

But while the referee’s performance was shocking, they became too consumed with every decision and it meant Greenhalgh had to replace midfielder Scott Wagstaff, who was booked after just two minutes, at the break to avoid going down to 10 men.

Asked if they put too much energy into worrying about the referee, Greenhalgh responded: “We've had games like that where the players are too frustrated by the ref.

“I'm disappointed that we've had to take Wagy off. I know Wagy can control himself, but in reality I couldn't trust the ref because he's telling me he's going to send him off.

“We can't afford to lose Wagy. You have to change things because of decisions that have gone wrong. That's difficult.

“Right before half-time, Max Fiddes had a blatant penalty, which we've looked back on, where he's about to tap it in the back of the net and he's been yanked by his neck.

“That obviously plays on players' emotions. But I think in reality, we still kicked on. We still went and scored two goals in the second half.

“It wasn't a case of it ruining our performance. I think the defensive areas were poor, we let players shoot from the edge of the box when we shouldn't be letting them shoot and we've let runners go when we shouldn't be letting them go.

“I don't think that was down to frustration. It's just that, as a group, we've just got to get back to keeping clean sheets.”