Bradford City did not get what they deserved against Crewe Alexandra, insists 'gutted' Graham Alexander

The Bantams were riding the crest of a wave heading into the fixture, having gone unbeaten in their last six league games. However, a first-half penalty from Chris Long proved decisive at the Mornflake Stadium.

Alexander’s men had the lion’s share of chances and enjoyed more possession, only adding to the frustration of defeat. Speaking after the loss, Alexander said: “I don’t think we got what we deserved from that performance. It’s a disappointing result as we dominated and created the best chances in the game

“Crewe have got a decent home record, but the penalty is the only shot they had on target – Harry Lewis didn’t have a save to make for the rest of the game.

“I’m gutted, although it was a penalty and we just switched off for 10 seconds in the game. We kept Crewe far away from our goal and created a lot of opportunities. We were a bit careless with our deliveries at times when we got up there, but when we showed that quality we should have scored.”

Masterminding comebacks is never easy and it is certainly difficult when there is not much to urge improvement of. Alexander said: “I was struggling at half-time to find a way to improve it.

"They had scored, but we’d defended exceptionally well apart from a 10-second spell when they got the penalty and when we lost focus. But I thought we could have had a couple of penalties ourselves with the way Andy Cook was manhandled throughout the game.

“We did create chances, we hit the bar and their keeper has made a couple of good saves. All in all we should have got more points over the holiday period, but we have won games previously when we haven’t played as well as we have today.”