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The manager praises the players and fans after the loss to promotion-chasing Bolton Wanderers but says his team must stop being a bad luck story in the final quarter of the season.

• Darrel Clarke | “There is not much that I can criticize about our performance”
• Port Vale’s manager speaks to the media after the 2-1 loss to Bolton Wanderers in League One
• Clarke: “Many thanks to the excellent support we brought here today, they got the guys back throughout the game and it was a performance from the guys that probably warranted more.”

Port Vale manager Darrell Clarke felt his team deserved more than a spirited performance at Bolton Wanderers on Saturday afternoon.

Ellis Harrison gave the Vale the lead as Clarke’s side flew out of the blocks and created three fine chances in the first ten minutes.

Goals from Victor Adeboyejo and Josh Sheehan had the hosts in front before half an hour though, with Vale coming close to equalizing on several occasions, but unable to prevent Bolton from strengthening their grip on fourth place in the League. One.

Speaking after the match, Clarke said:

“There’s not much I can criticize about the performance other than being soft on what I think could have been his only two shots on goal. We have to defend better than that.

“For my team to come here and have a right and be up front for most of the game, getting nothing is an absolute sham, to be honest with you.

“Many thanks to the great support that we brought here today, they got the guys back throughout the game and it was a performance from the guys that probably deserved more.

“We made some good moves together; We just haven’t defended for five or 10 minutes of the game that we needed to defend, a bit similar to Tuesday night against Morecambe with all our territory, but we have to stop being a little soft on the other end.

Clarke’s team might feel bad that they didn’t walk away with more than one game in which they were the better team for the most part, though the coach added that his team needs to stop being the unlucky team.

“There is no panic about our situation,” he explained. “We’re at 40 points with 25% of the season to go and I would have cut your hand off for that at the start of the season, so we’ll just build towards the next game.

“We have had a lot of disappointing results in the third quarter, as I call it, we have justified a lot more, but we have to stop being a bad luck story and make sure we get as many points as we can in the last 12.”

Clarke started Harrison and Matty Taylor together for the first time since the latter joined Vale on loan from Oxford United and the manager added that the duo will be important in the last 12 games for his team.

“I thought Matty Taylor was outstanding, Ellis was outstanding and having nines at the top of the field will certainly help us,” he continued. “The team will continue to work hard and the boys are giving me their all. I can’t criticize the effort, the commitment or the desire, the desire to win, I really can’t, and we’ll be back.”