Plymouth Argyle head coach Tom Cleverley says his side’s busy schedule caught up with them as they lost 1-0 at Rotherham United.
The defeat at the Millers ended a run of five games in 14 days – four of which were away from Home Park.
Argyle have had to travel to Blackpool, Leyton Orient, Luton Town and Rotherham in that fortnight – return journeys totalling almost 1,750 miles for the squad.
They now have a week to prepare for the visit of Doncaster Rovers on 7 March.
“I wouldn’t say I’m angry because I’ve got a group of players that are giving everything and a few of them have probably needed rotating,” Cleverley told BBC Radio Devon.
“The two weeks of four away games and five games in total just looked like it caught up with us today.”
The loss left Argyle in 12th place in League One, six points off the play-off places with 12 games to play.
Cleverley says he was frustrated that his side were not able to come up with a goal against relegation threatened Rotherham, who took what proved to be a decisive seventh-minute lead through Joe Rafferty.
“It’s a phase of the game that we’ve struggled a little bit when we’re chasing games and we have more of the ball and we’re ringing their box,” Cleverley added.
“Having that quality to make sure that we break defences down and we need to try and crack that one.
“But today we’re really disappointed because if we came here and won then we really are in the conversation, and we just can’t take that next step to make sure that we are firmly in that conversation.”
