Tranmere Rovers manager Micky Mellon was pleased that his players kept battling to earn a late point in a 1-1 home draw against Southend United at Prenton Park on Friday night.
Paul Mullin's penalty on 84 minutes earned a share of the spoils in the Sky Bet League One fixture after Tom Hopper had netted the opener for the Shrimpers.
And boss Mellon was satisfied with the desire shown after half-time as Rovers earned a draw.
Mellon said: "We had a problem, and we had to try and fix it at half-time, and I think that we created the tempo then without being brilliant with the football, I felt we upped the tempo and looked more aggressive and in terms of spirit and desire. We keep going and we keep battling.
"We eventually got that equaliser, and the only thing that beat us was time, but we know where we need to improve on moving forward.
"I didn't think that we started anywhere near the tempo that the game asked of us, that we didn't for some reason want to meet or go above those levels, you sometimes get that and I don't know why.
"You've got to try and make the tempo of the game, the running power of the game, the knockdowns of the game, we came out as the home team and we never really did that today, we gave away a really poor goal.
"It is a really poor goal and you would have to say that, I'm just trying to make sure that I stand here and never make excuses."
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