Cambridge manager Mark Bonner praised his injury-hit side’s work ethic after they ended a five-match losing streak with a 3-2 League One victory at Wycombe.

The U’s led against the run of play at half-time at Adams Park but settled after the break and added a third goal through Lloyd Jones before holding firm against a home side who had won their last three games.

Bonner said: “I thought some of our defensive play was just outstanding, the work ethic of the team.

“Where we are, off the back of the results we’ve had, to come to such a tough place with players missing.

“I’m window-dressing on the bench tonight – we had three players on the bench that I can’t bring on the pitch.

“I can’t bring Shilow (Tracey) on tonight, can’t bring Sam (Smith) on tonight, can’t bring Liam O’Neil on tonight, they’re all carrying things, so I’m just making sure we’ve got some numbers for the warm-up and making sure we’ve got the characters around the team.

“Obviously, Fejiri (Okenabirhie) came off as well, which added to that, but I just thought the endeavour of the team was a brilliant reminder to us of what we are and what ‘good’ looks like for us, so there’s a bar set there that we’ve got to try and carry on.”

Cambridge led after six minutes through Harvey Knibbs’ well-taken finish, but Sam Vokes equalised for Wycombe with a header from Lewis Wing’s corner.

Almost straight after, the Chairboys thought they should have had a penalty for a foul on Anis Mehmeti, the U’s regained the lead through a wonderful curling effort by Jack Lankester.

Jones then effectively sealed the win by tapping in Lewis Simper’s corner, rendering Wing’s deflected effort in stoppage time just a consolation.

Wycombe boss Gareth Ainsworth refused to use the lack of a penalty award to his side as an excuse, saying: “They won tonight because they hit the net more times than us, simple, and the turning point’s our defending, nothing to do with anything else.

“Yes, we should have had a penalty, it’s an absolute stone-waller, but then we can’t not defend the counter attack that comes from that and then everyone argues about the penalty.

“Forget that, you’ve got to defend your box better.

“After three brilliant defensive performances I didn’t see that one coming and that shocked me tonight because we were well worth our goals, but you can’t defend like that and win games.

“We’ve looked at all three goals and all three of them are avoidable – and that’s really disappointing.

“There’s nothing I can say apart from it’s poor defending because if you score two goals at home you expect to win games.”