\n Latics came under the cosh at times, against a team that was battling back from starting the new season with three consecutive defeats.\n<\/p>\n
\n But it was the feat of overcoming their own disappointment in a first loss of the campaign, and the manner of it at home, that concerned him the most, and ultimately pleased him the most as Latics registered back-to-back away points and clean sheets.\n<\/p>\n
\n “MK Dons and here (Bristol Rovers) blow us right out of the the water (with investment). It’s incredible what they’re paying and doing here. I just wanted my boys to go and show the qualities they showed tonight, and they did in spadefuls,” said Mellon after a 0-0 draw at the Memorial Stadium.\n<\/p>\n
\n “We let ourselves down on Saturday. We didn’t start well and we gave ourselves a mountain to climb, but we’ve learnt about that and you could see that tonight. And the way that we started tonight is the way that you should start every game. You’ve got to contest every moment, find a way of doing the things you do to make you a decent team, and we did that much better tonight.\n<\/p>\n
\n “We need to show a bit more quality in front of goal and a bit more quality in different moments, but we looked good at times tonight and we’ll build on that.”\n<\/p>\n
\n After bouncing back from a 2-1 defeat to Swindon Town at Boundary Park, Mellon added: “We learnt a lesson on Saturday and we can’t wait for the tempo to drop to the one that you believe you might want to play at. You’ve got to go and meet that, or be the tempo, win all those scraps and battles and fight for the right to try to play.\n<\/p>\n
\n “We’ve learnt that and we showed those qualities tonight, and we’re going to have to continue to show that.\n<\/p>\n
\n “You need people to be disciplined and continue to do their jobs and I thought the front two led the line superbly well and were a real handful, the boys in midfield worked their socks off and the back four were excellent, won blocks and headers, and the goalkeeper made a good save when needed.\n<\/p>\n
\n “I always want to try to win but we stood our ground and it was important we came away from this looking a bit more like ourselves.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Latics have scored just twice in their opening four League Two games, but went close to making a breakthrough at Bristol Rovers, notably through Kane Drummond, who had two good chances either side of half-time and a Joe Quigley header before the break, while Tom Conlon will be disappointed not to make more of a late free kick.\n<\/p>\n
\n But their defensive work was crucial, and after reverting to a back four Latics looked more settled in their shape, with strong partnerships throughout the spine and a solid work ethic, while goalkeeper Mat Hudson positioned himself well and made two key saves in their half.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\n “You’ve got to score goals, that’s the bottom line,” said Mellon.\n<\/p>\n
\n “But to come to a place like this on a Tuesday night, to show the qualities that we showed and to get a result like we did, we’ve got to be pleased. Of course coming off the back of a result like Saturday you always want that wee bit more, but you’ve got to take what you get and respect the point, which we will, and I respect that group of players who went out there and put their bodies on the line and scrapped and fought and got us something.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Latics came under the cosh at times, against a team that was battling back from starting the new…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":358966,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8818],"tags":[381,748,393,4884,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-358965","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bristol","8":"tag-bristol","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115060149191120885","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=358965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/358966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=358965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=358965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=358965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}