Rovers boss Grant McCann was left disappointed that Rovers could not book their place in the second round of the Emirates FA Cup after being held to a draw by Accrington Stanley.
A Kelvin Mellor and an own goal and a stunning long-range strike from Harrison Biggins twice had Rovers ahead at the Eco-Power Stadium, only for the visitors to equalise through Shaun Whalley and Seamus Conneely.
Rovers dominated the first half but could not give themselves a cushion on the scoreline, which was the source of McCann’s frustration.
“I thought first half we were excellent,” he said. “We should have been out of sight by four or five and that’s not an exaggeration. Their keeper has made some world class saves from Mo Faal and Luke Molyneux in particular. He’s kept Accrington in the cup tie, especially in the first half.
“The second half was a lot more even. They scored off a mistake of ours. It was an unbelievable goal to get us back in front from Harrison Biggins - a tremendous strike. And then for the equaliser we just let a runner go from a corner.
“I’m disappointed not to win the game, given how good we were in the first half.
“You have to take your chances to win any game and we didn’t do that in the first half, ultimately.
“We did well to get ourselves back into the game in the second half after conceding.
“We’ll have to do it the hard way and go to Accrington to get ourselves into the next round. The most important thing is that we’re still in the hat. We’ll see what the draw throws up and then see how we go at Accrington.”
McCann admitted feeling disappointed to hear a smattering of boos from home supporters at full time.
He said: “This team has given us everything. I’m just disappointed that we’ve come off to boos and that has hurt us. The team is dejected in the changing room with the fact there is a pocket of fans wanting to boo us off the pitch.
“We’ve come up against a very good Accrington team, one of the better teams in League Two and we’ve gone toe to toe with them, if not being better than them.
“It was disappointing for us to hear that.”
