Manager Mark Robins felt his side mostly matched what high-flying Walsall had to offer and were unlucky not to come away with something from the game.
“It’s very difficult to take,” he told The Iron PlayerHD.“It’s a frustrating time to come out and talk after a defeat and it’s hard to take. We did okay today, but we’ve got to do better and stay with the runner. We’ve got a group of players who need to stand up and be counted. I keep saying the same things, but we have a group of players who are capable.
“We’ve played against a team at the top of the league and we’ve matched them mostly. They had decent opportunities, but you’d expect that – but so have we. What we haven’t done well enough is read the situations and been on the move to finish off an opportunity.
“Joe Lolley was exceptional in making chances and then almost took one or two himself. Then he turned unselfish where we would have wanted him to shoot, but he’s been bright for us tonight. Gary McSheffrey has done okay there and got some good balls into the box. The performances from Neal Bishop and Sean McAllister, in the second half, were outstanding – they’ve worked their socks off.
“We were more positive at the start of the second half and again it’s disappointing because we are so close yet so far. We’ve got to be better in both boxes and then we can turn things around.
“The only way we can do it is by staying positive and that’s the difficulty because there are detractors, but we’ve got to stay within our environment, remain positive and we will get through this. It’s a vicious circle, but we will get out of it. People question everything but from my perspective, with the experience that I’ve got, we have to remain true to ourselves and focused, but it can’t keep going on.
“I’ve got belief in the players, absolutely. I’m feeling for them a little bit, but I’m also annoyed that we’re not dealing with the issues. They’re easy to put right, but we will remain positive in difficult circumstances.
“I’m one-hundred-percent sure that whoever we come up against we can beat. But we’ve not done enough and we give them everything they need to be successful. There were quite a lot of supporters who were really encouraging tonight and I thank them for that. I’m not interested in the other stuff because it’s negative, it comes with the territory.
“I don’t enjoy it. I’m certainly not arrogant and it certainly has an impact, but I’ve got to stay focused and manage the team through the situation and bring us out of it.”
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