Boss Kieran McKenna admitted his side’s performance was poor and nowhere near the level required as the Blues snatched a late point at Blackburn Rovers, courtesy of Sindre Walle Egeli’s first goal for the club.

Town seemed destined to fall to a second defeat on the road in five days, having been defeated 2-1 at Oxford on Friday, until the Norwegian shot low past Rovers keeper Aynsley Pears in the 94th minute to secure a 1-1 draw.

“We snatched a point at the end,” McKenna said. “I think it was a poor performance from us on most aspects.

“I know where we’re at as a group, but that was well below the level that we’ve been at tonight, so we need to be really, really honest and frank about that.

“We’ve just spoken about that downstairs in a really honest way and where that performance tonight has come from, in my opinion.

“We take the moment at the end, good composure from a few of the players to set it up, really good finish from Sindre.

“I think there are lots of games this year from which we’ve deserved more than we’ve got. Tonight’s one in the other category, so you have to take them as they come.

“You want it to be a moment in the season we can look back on fondly, but we have and we will address the performance tonight because that level isn’t going to get us the season that we want.

“We’re not going to hide from that. We’re going to take the moment, we’re not going to hide from the other bit and we know we need to be a lot better.”

Asked where he felt the under-par display came from, he added: “I think there are few different bits. I spoke to the group downstairs. I think it comes a little bit from Friday night, the setback of a loss affects us more than I would want it to at the moment.

“I think Friday night was incomparable to tonight as a performance, a game that normally we would win but some moments went against us, and I think it knocked us more than I would want it to. And not just today, I saw it at the training ground yesterday as well.

“We need to be much stronger on that. There are some other things, but those are for sharing individually, but if I keep it to one I’d say I think it’s a follow-on from the disappointment the other night.

“You’re going to have them over the course of the season. I know it’s a new group and they haven’t had those good shared experiences yet and maybe not found that real resilience to bounce back from a defeat in the way we would want, but that starts the next day at the training ground.

“That disappointment probably came into the performance today and we can’t have that because, to be successful in the Championship, being resilient and robust individually and collectively is right up on the top of the charts and I didn’t think we were tonight.

“We’ve spoken about that, we’ll address it and we need to individually and collectively find more.”

Blackburn boss Valerian Ismael was in no doubt that Blues midfielder Azor Matusiwa should have been sent off when he brought down Ryoya Morishita when he was breaking through towards goal in the first half.

Quizzed on his view of the incident, in which the Dutchman was shown his eight yellow card of the season, McKenna said: “For my eyes on the sideline, it could have gone either way. He’s ahead of Azor, you’ve also got a really quick player [Leif Davis] chasing him down and he’s at a little bit of an angle.

“I’d normally want the referee not to send the player off if it’s borderline in the first half. Other than that, I’m sure if I was on their side I would have wanted the red card as well. It went our way tonight.”

The game was the restaging of the match in September which was abandoned in the 80th minute at 1-0 to Rovers with the Blues down to 10 men following Jacob Greaves’s sending off.

Town’s late equaliser this evening appeared to vindicate the EFL’s decision to replay the fixture rather than award the result to the Lancastrians.

“I’ve spoken about the replay loads,” McKenna said when asked whether he felt that was the case. “For me, you could feel it tonight, it’s obviously still something the opponent is upset about. That’s fair enough, I’m sure in their position they feel hard done by.

“I don’t think there’s any other decision that would have been fair. I said it after the last time, games of football can be crazy, can change on anything and in those conditions and what happened on the last occasions, there was no other way other than to play the game tonight.”

Quizzed on the messaging to the players ahead of the back-to-back home games against leaders Coventry and fourth-placed Stoke City on Saturday and Tuesday, McKenna added: “As always, some of the messaging has to stay private and inside, but the main one for me is that your response doesn’t start in the next match, your response is how you are with the group, how you are in training, how you are the next day.

“Part of a winning culture, a winning group is that when you have those setbacks a large majority of the group are coming in with a determination not just to show their very, very best of themselves the next day, but also to help others, to push others, to get around others. That’s what we need to see on Thursday morning.

“We’ll give the players a day off after the travel we’ve had and the late arrival tomorrow, everyone needs to recover and refresh.

“And then on Thursday, everyone needs to come in ready to give the absolute best of themselves, but also to step up and give to the group and that’s what you need when you have a setback.

“Tonight, in terms of the late result, we could sit here and kid ourselves and say, ‘what a brilliant away point, what a great goal’. Of course, we’ll try and take those positives, but in reality the performance, it was a bit step back and we pride ourselves on trying to be the best that we can be.

“So we need to find a response that starts on Thursday morning that builds the confidence, that builds the trust, that builds the resilience in a team that we’re going to need when we face a really good team at Portman Road on Saturday.”

McKenna refused to blame tiredness for the display, the game having been the third on the road in eight days and the fourth of a run of seven in 22 days.

“No, I don’t use it,” he said. “Maybe it has, maybe it hasn’t. But, for me, no excuses.”

Meanwhile, McKenna confirmed the injury Wes Burns suffered in the U21s last night is nothing too significant, the Welshman having been subbed at half-time on his comeback following the ACL tear which has kept him out since January.

“No, a big gash on his leg,” he said. “Thankfully, it doesn’t look like any major ligament damage, so hopefully just a minor setback. Hopefully won’t take too long to heal up.”

Photo: TWTD