Leyton Orient boss hoping better times lie ahead

The defeat caps off what has been a disastrous season for the East London outfit, who finished bottom of the table to be relegated to non-league for the first time in their history.

Orient's youthful side put in a spirited display at Bloomfield Road but in truth they never threatened to cause an upset.

Speaking post-match, Riza said: "It was always going to be game where, irrespective of whether we won, lost, or drew, it was about giving our fans the chance to watch our last game in the Football League for a while.

"It was nice to say goodbye to them at the end and hopefully there will be better times ahead.

"At the start of the week we thought there might be a chance our fans might not be able to watch the game which was hugely disappointing.

"But they made the right call and to have almost 1,000 people make the trip up to Blackpool is all credit to them. I can't think any higher of them."

MATCH REPORT: Blackpool 3-1 Leyton Orient

Pool eased to a 2-0 lead at half time thanks to goals from Neil Danns and Mark Cullen.

The visitors had briefly threatened an unlikely comeback when Jens Janse reduced arrears but Andy Taylor soon restored the two-goal lead to ensure the three points went Pool's way.

Riza added: "We thought they were going to play a 4-1-4-1 because they've played that for the last three or four games. The last time they played 3-5-2 was at Doncaster.

"So maybe they tried to do something different against us and thought they could cause us problems in the wide areas.

"We thought we could contain them in the first half but we let in a sloppy goal, which we've had a habit of doing.

"But in the second half we decided to match them up and go 3-5-2 as well and maybe catch them in behind their wing backs and we managed to cause problems.

"We managed to get a goal back but we got caught on the counter."