Leyton Orient’s struggles continued as they fell to a 3-0 defeat against Shrewsbury at The Croud Meadow, marking their fourth consecutive loss of the season.
Despite Orient’s efforts to turn their season around, Shrewsbury took the lead in the 22nd minute through Leo Castledine, who scored his first senior goal. The on-loan Chelsea midfielder latched onto a well-timed through-ball from Tommi O’Reilly and fired past Zach Hemming to give the hosts the advantage.
Orient’s best chance to equalise came when Daniel Agyei cut in from the right and unleashed a shot that skimmed the top of the crossbar. However, it was a day of missed opportunities for the visitors, who struggled to break down Shrewsbury’s defence.
As Orient pushed forward for an equaliser, Shrewsbury took advantage of the space left at the back. With eight minutes left, Thomas Bloxham doubled the lead for the home side with a stunning 25-yard strike.
Bloxham then sealed the victory deep into stoppage time, converting a knock-down from George Lloyd to make it 3-0 and leave Orient still searching for their first points of the season.
The defeat leaves Orient rooted at the bottom of the table, with manager Richie Wellens needing to find solutions quickly to halt their worrying start to the campaign.
Site Opinion
These are tough times at Orient. They were on the cusp of the promotion race last season, always just a little adrift but never in any danger. However, in this encounter, they’ve lost to a team supposedly in disarray following a confusing summer, and yet Salop made the visitors look ordinary.
Ritchie Wellens has much work to do picking his side up from this. Their game with Peterborough United has been postponed due to international call-ups, and there’s going to be a lot of work for the former Doncaster man to do on the training field.
His side look lost already this season, and while he has credit in the bank after a strong campaign last time out, that credit is draining away. However, there is a feeling after this encounter that the players, rather than Wellens, are at fault.
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