ANOTHER game of two halves left Stanley boss John Coleman frustrated, but pleased with a point against Mansfield.

The Reds were well below par in the first half and fell behind to Chris Clements’ set-piece, although Coleman felt the free-kick should never have been awarded.

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And despite Terry Gornell grabbing a point with his first goal of the season, and a much-improved second-half showing, the Accrington manager said some of the decisions were ‘staggering’, and was also bemused by his side being booed off at half-time.

He said: “We were pretty poor in the first half.

“Jimmy (Bell) made a comment at half-time that you can probably count on one hand the amount of times we’ve been booed off here.

“I don’t know what they (the fans) get out of booing, they can do what they want, but I don’t see how it benefits anybody.

“But we were better second half.

“Maybe the system didn’t work that I employed, so I have to look at myself first which I always try to do.

“There were a lot of harsh words said though, because systems can go out of the window if you don’t apply yourselves and we didn’t apply ourselves.

“They were first to every ball, we didn’t pass it, we didn’t go tight, and we allowed them to do what they wanted really.

“Second half was a totally different game - I don’t think they went near our goal, to be honest.

“A lot of time-wasting, very stop-start, an interesting performance from the referee.”

When pushed about the officials, Coleman said he felt the free-kick for the Stags’ goal was not a foul, and also mentioned a penalty shout at the other end that went against his side as well as a goal chalked off for offside.

Coleman, whose side are 11th, said: “He (the referee) has invented a free-kick on the edge of the box, unfortunately for us.

“We have a similar incident, he blows and everybody in the ground thinks he’s given a penalty for us and it’s a free-kick against Jordan Clark.

“It was staggering really.

“I think it’s got a deflection, the free-kick, which is disappointing for us, but I think that was the only real shot they had on target.

“It will be interesting to see Sean McConville’s goal that was disallowed because everyone on the pitch was adamant he was onside.

“It was a very late flag as well, which makes you think the linesman wasn’t 100 per cent sure.

“We’ll watch it and probably moan about it.”

He added: “We were a lot better second half and we did get something out of the game.

“If we’d done that to Morecambe and Exeter, which we could have easily done, we’d be two points better off and in a lot healthier league position.

“There’s still bright things there, but we feel as though we’ve thrown two points away with an insipid first-half performance.”