PAUL Simpson reacted to Carlisle's loss against Blackpool in the Central League Cup which featured a number of first-team stars.

The match against a youthful Tangerines side saw Carlisle United field a number of first-team faces, including Jayden Harris, Jack Stretton and Tobi Sho-Silva.

Despite the strength of the Blues side that was marshalled by assistant manager Gav Skelton, the young Championship side secured a 0-2 victory.

Paul Simpson believes that this was a good chance for these players to get some minutes, but accepted that overall performance showed that more match sharpness is needed.

He said: "I think it showed in the perfomance that they need more match minutes.

"That was important to get the run out there, all of them their level of performance showed that they were short and that's something as a group of staff we need to look at because we can't have them going into games and not being able to play a full 90 minutes so that's something we are going to have to address.

"They are going to have to work harder away from games to make sure that they are ready when their opportunity comes."

However, Simpson did also praise the strength of his squad and the positive attitude surrounding rotation.

He said: "Over the whole season whoever has been called in to come into the starting eleven, they have done a really good job, but the challenege is maintaing that for the whole of the season."

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