After a poor team performance in Darlington's first defeat in six outings, captain Craig Liddle believes Quakers have no need to worry just yet about the club's play-off chances.

After months of unpredictable results, Darlington seemed to have found some consistency by stringing together five unbeaten games. But at Roots Hall on Saturday only Liddle impressed as Quakers slumped to a defeat that sees them drop down to eighth in the table.

They aim to get back to winning ways at 18th-placed Bury on Saturday, a game Liddle says has taken on added importance.

He said: "We went five games unbeaten but all teams have a blip now and again, unfortunately for us it happened to us at one of our rivals.

"But this squad is more than capable of getting into the play-offs so we're not going to panic after one defeat.

"After the game the gaffer was annoyed but he pointed out the positives. He reminded us that we'd gone five games unbeaten and that we've now got to put this defeat to bed and immediately start looking forward to next Saturday's game.

"It's now more important that we go to go to Bury and pick up a good result down there."

After missing ten games with various injuries, and having played just 45 minutes of reserve team football, Liddle eased back into the starting XI without any signs of rustiness and he was involved throughout at Southend.

The 33-year-old stalwart blocked several shots and won countless headers on his return to action.

He was also involved in a second half incident which led to David Hodgson being sent to the stands; Wayne Gray knocked the ordinarily rugged defender to the floor with a rough challenge, one which prompted a war of words on the touchline that ended in Hodgson receiving his marching orders.

The incident was typical of a keenly-contested game between two promotion rivals.

Just as Darlington were last week eager to avenge a 4-0 defeat to Shrewsbury, Southend were clearly determined to settle a score with Quakers who thrashed the Shrimpers 4-0 in October.

The contest was physical but, for most of the time, fair and Liddle admitted: "It was a hard game to come back to. We knew it was going to be difficult but we just didn't perform as we would have liked.

"It was a disappointing result against a good side but on our day we are better than them, but we let ourselves down and haven't been able to show that we're better than Southend.

"We were under pressure from the first minute which, for me, was probably the best thing because it meant I could get back into the groove of things without having too much time to think about it.

"Freddy Eastwood probably changed the game when he came on. We were comfortable at 0-0 and I couldn't see them scoring.

"But he's lively, quick and caused us problems.

"Even though they had the ball more than us, we restricted their chances and I thought we defended very well. But you can only withstand so much pressure so maybe it was only a matter of time before they scored."

Liddle's re-emergence after nine weeks out comes after his second longest spell in the treatment room since joining Darlington in 1997, the longest was 12 weeks with a broken ankle in 2001, but he couldn't have timed his return much better.

Curtis Fleming was recently ruled out for three weeks with a hamstring injury so Quakers, with David McGurk also now free from injury, are fortunate to have a squad that can accommodate such injuries.

And Liddle says he now feels in much better shape. He explained: "I had a double hernia and a few others bits and bobs in the pubic bone area that needed sorting - a torn oblique muscle and a torn tendon - but I'm stitched back together and feeling great.

"Right now it's probably the best I've felt after a game since the Boston away game last March. Ever since then I've never been pain free so to get through the full 90 minutes was really pleasing.

"The gaffer said before the game that I should play as long as I can, but fortunately I felt OK for the full game. My body will be a bit stiff in the morning, but that's only to be expected.

"I didn't go to any of the away games, not being involved I found it hard enough watching the home games.

"So I've been going to watch Newcastle with my little son which has been very nice but you can't beat playing so it feels great to be back in the team."

* Darlington's league-winning youth team won 2-0 at York City on Saturday.

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