Cobblers boss Keith Curle said his side paid the price for an early lapse of concentration in Saturday’s 1-0 home defeat to Accrington Stanley.
“It wasn’t the best of games with not a lot of quality on show from either side,” he said.
“One lapse in concentration cost us the early goal and that was disappointing. That gave Accrington something to hang on to and they managed the game well.
“I can’t fault the application, attitude and effort of the players today in difficult conditions but we still need that little bit more game knowhow.
“Things are not quite going our way at the moment and there were a couple of off-side decisions that I felt went against us but we know we need to improve.
“We’ve come up a division, we’ve lost some good players and there are going to be clubs like ourselves who are going to struggle at times in the current climate but we will stick together, we will keep at it and we will keep going.”