Orient manager Russell Slade was unhappy with Oldham's first goal Pic: Simon O'Connor

League One: Oldham Athletic 2 Leyton Orient 0

Orient’s hopes of taking a point from Saturday’s game at Boundary Park were wrecked when the home side struck twice in the final 13 minutes.

The encounter looked destined to finish goalless until former Olympiakos striker Matt Derbyshire opened the Latics account on 77 minutes following a corner and any hopes of an Orient comeback were quashed when Jose Baxter grabbed a second shortly afterwards.

But Orient boss Russell Slade took some positives from the defeat and insisted the opening goal should not have been allowed: “I have to tell you it’s a blatant hand ball, he (Matt Derbyshire) has used his arm to control the ball to volley it in and that hurts and the first goal is crucial,” he said.

“I thought our defensive shape was excellent and we looked comfortable. It hurts, it really hurts. Especially the first goal because it’s illegal, you can’t bring it down on your arm and volley it in and lose that way, it isn’t right.”

Despite the sense of injustice, Slade believed there were plenty of positives to emerge: “I thought we were excellent for 77 minutes against a really good Oldham side,” he said.

“The effort was unbelievable the lads ran themselves into the ground.”

Oldham made the early running and visiting keeper Ryan Allsop had to make a smart stop to deny Baxter after just seven minutes and shortly afterwards the former Everton man had another opportunity, but this time saw his header bounce down and then over the bar.

O’s struggled to create many chances of their own, their best effort in the first 45 minutes came when Martin Rowlands forced home keeper Dean Bouzanis into a save following a volley from the edge of the box.

But it was defences that dominated and with both sides lacking a cutting edge a goalless draw always looked on the cards.

The second half followed a similar pattern, but O’s went close on the hour when

Rowlands almost caught out the home keeper with a free kick that drifted fractionally wide.

The vital breakthrough came 13 minutes from time when the visitors failed to deal with a corner and when Cliff Byrne headed the ball on Derbyshire added the finishing touch from close range.

Six minutes later Baxter wrapped things up with a goal of genuine quality when he fired home from just outside the area to wrap up Oldham’s third win in four games.

Oldham: Bouzanis; Wabara, Byrne, M’voto, Grounds; Crofts, Wesolowski, Simpson (Sutherland 71 mins), Montano (Smith 71); Baxter, Derbyshire

Subs: Cisak, Brown, Tarkowski, Furman, M’Changama

Leyton Orient: Allsop; McSweeney, Clarke, Chorley, Sawyer; Rowlands; Odubajo (Cox 67), Smith, Griffith, Wagstaff; Brunt (Symes 73)

Subs: Jones, Baudry, Laird, James, Mooney

Orient bookings: McSweeney

Referee: Scott Duncan

Attendance: 3,919 (including 171 Orient fans)