Skipper Kevin Lokko says Dover need to go back to basics after admitting Saturday's display against Boreham Wood was unacceptable.

The 2-0 defeat was Dover's seventh in 13 National League outings at Crabble and Lokko said the players let themselves and their manager down.

The 24-year-old centre-half, back after injury for the first time in six weeks, explained: "I'm not going to repeat word for word what he (manager Andy Hessenthaler) said in there (the dressing room) because, as you'd expect, it wasn't too nice.

"He's very disappointed, we let him down, he emphasised that in the changing room.

"We let ourselves down, we let the fans and the club down.

"You can see today the amount of supporters who came (728 – Dover's third lowest home gate this season), it's getting less and less by the week and that's not going to change unless we put in performances and wins.

"Obviously we've got quite a bad record at home. We managed to get ourselves up and going against Southend, and had a decent performance last week against Peterborough (both in the FA Cup).

"We expected a response today but we didn't give it, it wasn't something we expected or planned for, or trained for.

"We worked hard this week and to go and produce that is not acceptable."

Lokko denied the poor performance was due to a lack of commitment, more a shortage of confidence and says no-one is hurting more than the players.

• Defeat leaves Hess at a loss
• Dover Athletic 0 Boreham Wood 2 match report

He added: "We're all committed to the cause every single week, we always put 100% in , it's just a lack of quality today, maybe a lack of belief in ourselves as a team, to score goals and keep clean sheets.

"It's tough (the home form), we don't take it lightly, it affects us, it affects us when we're at home, when we're at football, it affects our lives, it's not like we don't care.

"We all come in the morning after a defeat and we're gutted.

"We all hate losing. It's a real kick in the teeth when we serve up something like that but we have to stick together and we will.

"We need to keep it simple and really go down to basics and just put balls in areas, be solid and try to nick goals like we do away from home where we're solid and play on the counter-attack.

"We need to find a way, however that is, ugly or pretty, to win games. It's just fine details."

Lokko was back in the starting line-up for the first time since picking up an ankle injury against Stockport on October 26 and he admitted his return had not been without problems.

He explained: "I'm feeling good, it's the first time in six weeks that I've been pain-free.

"It's been a really tough rehab for me. I was meant to be back after two weeks, but had a setback, then four weeks, I had another setback but at six weeks I feel good touch wood so hopefully I can kick on now and get some games under my belt."

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