JAMIE O’Hara admits he was embarrassed to be Billericay Town’s player-manager as his side capitulated and suffered a 3-2 defeat to National League South strugglers Tonbridge Angels.

Town were two goals ahead at the break thanks to goals from debutant Femi Akinwande and Queens Park Rangers loanee Ody Alfa.

But a quickfire brace from former Concord Rangers winger Khale Da Costa and Tom Derry allowed Tonbridge to snatch all three points and O’Hara launched a scathing attack on his players.

“We fell apart,” said O’Hara, who took charge in September.

“I said to them at half-time that 2-0 is a sticky scoreline and we should have been three or four goals ahead.

“Within two minutes it was 2-2 and yet I had spent 10 minutes at half-time telling them to stop crosses because that was all they were going to do.

“We allowed them to put three crosses into our penalty area within the first two minutes.

“The defending was embarrassing and I won’t stick up for them because that was an absolute disgrace of a second half from them.

“People want to play for Billericay because we play nice football but if you’re not going to take the game by the scruff of the neck when it’s 2-2 or 2-1, it’s not good enough.

“I was embarrassed to stand there and manage that team in the second half.

“Gifton (Noel-Williams) and I, on the sidelines, want to fight but there was no fight.

“None of them fought, they just want to play nice football.”

The defeat also saw Callum Kennedy stretchered off just a matter of weeks after making his return from a long-term injury lay-off.

And O’Hara hopes the former AFC Wimbledon left-back will not be on the sidelines for an extended period of time.

“Callum is one of our best players,” admitted O’Hara.

“He gives us balance and defends that side correctly.

“Callum going off near the end of the first half affected us.”

Billericay will travel to Dartford on Saturday and O’Hara insists his side will be working on the basics of defending heading into the National League South duel.

“We will work on defending set pieces and stopping crosses,” added O’Hara.

“That’s it. Until we stop conceding from crosses and set pieces, we’re not doing anything else.

“They can play football, you can see that. But they have got to defend properly because it is not acceptable.

“It was criminal and it cost us big time.”