Laird left gutted by late Oxford equaliser

The stoppage-time equaliser which robbed Dons of all three points against Oxford United was a real sucker-punch said Ethan Laird.

The Manchester United loanee put in an excellent performance against the U's but was floored when Elliot Lee headed in in the 97th minute to snatch a draw for the visitors, cancelling out Andrew Surman's first half opener.

The result kept Dons 14th in League One and was a huge disappointment for Laird, who felt they more than deserved the win.

"We worked so hard, it's a bummer really because we didn't deserve that," he said afterwards. "It's something we need to learn on and we will get better.

"We have to sometimes survive those first half because teams feel like they can get at us for the first 10 or 15 minutes. But once that happens, no-one can touch us. We have to keep that belief and keep doing what we do.

"It's disappointing not to get three points but it shows the quality we have.

"We always want three points, but we have to work on our mistakes and go into the Gillingham game."

On his own performance, Laird added: "I played well, I'm still striving to get better and better and better. That's why I'm here – I want to help the team do as well as we can."