The Sky Blues Under-21s coach also praised central midfielder Conor Thomas and striker Bassala Sambou...
Coventry City Under-21s coach Lee Glover believes the 3-0 defeat to Sheffield United was a 'cruel scoreline'.
The Sky Blues suffered defeat at Stocksbridge Park Steels against the Blades as a CJ Hamilton strike and a brace from Diego De Girolamo sealed the home victory.
Glover had four scholars start the game and a further two Academy players come off the bench, and he admitted the club is short at the moment because of injuries.
The Under-21s coach said: "It is a cruel scoreline, we've done ok in the middle part of the pitch and controlled possession quite well at times but in the boxes, we're short.
"We've got two scholars playing centre-back out of position and really we're down to the bare bones in terms of numbers.
"I thought Conor Thomas did well in the middle of the park and I thought Bassala Sambou also came out of the game with a lot of credit.
"We've been down on numbers for a month now and it's showing in the results. We maybe short at the moment but I'm still impressed with the levels of effort I'm seeing."
Darragh Leahy and Callum Maycock started at centre-back for the Sky Blues, both out of position, and Glover praised the levels of effort from the young players.
He added: "The whole point of the Under-21s is to get players into the first-team and progress them on. We've got young players exposed to the level and that will bode us well.
"We were chasing the game at 1-0 down and I think the two centre-backs became a little bit exposed as we pushed forward for an equaliser. That happens in football.
"They should be happy with the way they played today though and I thought they were superb. I couldn't fault Darragh or Callum, they put a real shift in.
"The problem we had was that when teams have a little bit of quality and strength in depth, they will put us under pressure and inexperience will get caught out."