FLEETWOOD Town assistant boss Rob Kelly admitted Rovers ‘could have been out of sight’ at half-time but credited his side for their second half display.

And that was why he was slightly disappointed not to come out of the game with something as Richie Smallwood scored a late winner to move Rovers in to the automatic promotion spots. 

Bradley Dack’s goal had Rovers ahead at the break, with Tony Mowbray’s men in complete control and unlucky not to have more than a goal to show for their dominance.

Fleetwood battled hard in the second half, with one of their substitutes Connor McAleny pouncing on a Charlie Mulgrew error to level things up in the 56th minute.

Things were more even thereafter before Smallwood struck the winner, and when asked for his assessment, Kelly said: “Disappointed with the result.

“I thought in the end we deserved to get something on the basis of the second half showing.

“Overall we were disappointed.

“We’re playing against a very good team, a team we expect will go on, Tony has done a good job with them and they have some really good players.

“But we concentrate on ourselves, they did play well, six games in 20 days on the back of a hectic Christmas period caught up with us.

“That’s not an excuse, that’s how it is, and I thought we couldn’t get going.

“Second half was more like us, we went toe-to-toe with them and matched them.

“That’s why we’re disappointed. They could have been out of sight in the first half, they were much better than us, but we hung in there, got in by hook or by crook at 1-0 and the second half was much more like us.”

Fleetwood sent on McAleny and George Glendon at the break in a double switch which Kelly said added more life to the side.

“We needed to do something,” he said of the changes.

“Our players have played a lot of games so we needed to shake things up, it freshened it up, slightly different dynamic on the pitch and it was much more like us in the second half.

“The people that came on, I think we upped it generally, the first 45 we didn’t get going and it was a spirit and organisation that got us through, they were much better than us and could have been out of sight.

“We hung in there, gave ourselves an opportunity, and disappointed to lose the game and with the winning goal.”

Mulgrew’s error offered Fleetwood a route back in to the match, but Kelly felt the Cod Army were too passive in the first half and failed to get about Rovers as they hoped.

“They have good players for this league and you can’t give them time to play,” he told BBC Radio Lancashire.

“We didn’t do that enough in the first half, we weren’t on the front foot, which isn’t like us, but we got about them and enforced ourselves on them physically.

“We forced an error, scored, and on the second half we’re disappointed not to have come out with something.”