Stirling Albion boss Darren Young believed his side turned in their worst 45 minutes of the season at Albion Rovers – but hailed their determination to come away with a battling point.
The Coatbridge side gave the flying Binos everything they could handle in a first half which they dominated and deservedly went in a goal up at the break due to a Charlie Reilly strike.
But Stirling fought their way back into the game and even overcame a Robert Thomson red card to snatch a late point thanks to Dale Carrick’s seventh goal in seven games.
The result – coupled with Dumbarton’s 2-0 home win over Stranraer – means the Binos fall off the top of the League Two table but stretch their unbeaten run in all competitions to nine games.
Gaffer Young knows his squad can do much better than their first-half display showed, but praised hotshot forward Carrick for another crucial strike to earn a share of the spoils.
He said: “The first half was probably our worst performance of the season, by far.
“We never really competed, we spoke about trying to play in behind and we did that to start with and had opportunities to put the ball in the box but that didn’t happen.
“They came into the game and a mistake just cost us, it cost us last week for the goal and it did again, we’ve just got to clear our lines and for me, it’s an easy clearance.
“We end up stopping the ball for the guy and he comes in and finishes.
“He’s the player we spoke about before the game, their main attacking player, and put it on a plate for him so I was really disappointed with that.
“We never really tested the goalkeeper enough, no major chances and the extra man in midfield caused some problems in picking up second balls.
“We spoke about it at half time and I thought we did really well, we were at it at the start of the second half.
“The free kick was a great delivery by Kai and a great finish from Dale, he’s on fire at the moment and we almost nicked it at the end, it’s the sign of a good team when you don’t play well and you get something out of the game, especially when you’re down to ten men.”
The manager also said he had no complaints over the red card for Thomson, whose lunging tackle on the halfway line earned him immediate marching orders from referee Iain Snedden.
“Thommo knows it himself and will hold his hands up.
“It’s stupid diving in there and he gives the referee an opportunity to send him off and it looked like a red card from where I was.
“I would’ve been wanting it if it was me.”
