Joey Barton believes Bristol Rovers delivered a performance to build on after Ryan Loft's stoppage-time equaliser rescued a deserved point for the Gas at Exeter City on Saturday.
St James Park seemed haunted for Rovers last season, conceding nine first-half goals across two trips to Exeter, but this time around they were the better side in a 2-2 draw. Only their own errors put them in danger of defeat, but Loft headed substitute Sylvester Jasper's tantalising cross beyond Jamal Blackman in the second minute of added time to end a three-game losing run for Rovers.
The Gas are still winless in eight in the league and remain 21st in the table, but this was a dramatically improved performance from Barton's side. They were defensively solid and deservedly took the lead through John Marquis in the second half. Exeter's attack had been blunted, but Rovers gifted them a route back into the game with Antony Evans bringing down Jack Sparkes in the area, allowing Jevani Brown to equalise with the Grecians' first shot on target.
What had looked like being an excellent afternoon for the Gas took a nightmarish twist nine minutes from time, with a rare mistake from goalkeeper James Belshaw – with the ball bouncing over his head as he rushed out of his area to clear – presented Sam Nombe with the easiest of chances.
But Rovers dug deep and were worthy of their equaliser, and Barton believes his team took a "big step in the right direction".
"After going behind I think it is (a point gained)," he said. "We’re disappointed we’ve not taken all three because we felt our performance, certainly for 89 minutes of it, was worthy of that.
"It’s something to build on. It’s a really tough place for us to come historically and tough in my short period at the club. We had two disastrous results here and I thought we showed a real level of maturity considering how many young players we had today.
"There are little bits we need to iron out and I know we’ll get to them. Belly has arguably been our most consistent player in my time here and he’s probably saved us about 65 goals, so we’ll let him off that one today.
"For us, the character of the team, responding and getting back in it and pushing for the equaliser, was evident again and it gives us something to build off."
St James Park, of course, was where Barton delivered the soundbite of last season. After a 4-1 defeat in August 2021, continuing a poor start to the campaign, the manager vowed Rovers would be promoted and he was proved right on the final day of the campaign.
With tongue in cheek, Barton was asked by BBC Radio Bristol commentator Richard Hoskin if he wanted to make any forecasts for this season.
"Honestly, I think we’re a really good team," Barton replied. "I think I’ve got a really good group on my hands. It’s very young and I get that, but you’ve seen today some really mature performances.
"Our back three today was 20, 20 and 21. That is incredibly young and if you look through the team there are a lot of young players out there and we’ve got some young players to come back.
"I think we’ve got a really good team building. I’m not going to be stupid enough to say we’ll get promoted out of the gate, but I think we’ll have a really good season and as the season grows we’ll get stronger and stronger. Today for us is a big step in the right direction by showing we can handle a side that plays really physically."
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