Stags’ boss Steve Evans was left to rue his side’s missed chances after they were held 0-0 by local rivals Notts County this afternoon.
The local derby at Meadow Lane ended goalless after a tightly-fought contest in which Stags undoubtedly carved out the best opportunities.
Defender Rhys Bennett saw a number of headers fly wide in the first half before striker Yoann Arquin missed a gilt-edged chance in the second period when he dragged an effort wide from just a few yards out and the manager was frustrated to see his side miss the quality of chances which they created.
“We’ve made probably the only two real chances of the game, one from a corner and one that Yoann Arquin misses which he’ll have sleepless nights tonight and probably tomorrow. I think we were the team trying to win the derby," the Stags' manager said.
“We helped them because we missed a couple of simple chances. You can’t make the quality of chances that we make and not take them.
“We’ve done a lot of work on the training ground on freeing people up from set plays and we freed our central defenders up on two occasions and they should end up in the net, but we put them wide.
“In the second half, I think we probably, from an attacking point of view, just lacked in the final third and we’ve said that for a couple of weeks now, hence the two changes late on.”
The gaffer believes that although his side created the better chances in the game, they probably didn’t do enough to deserve to win the contest.
“I just said to the players: did we really do enough today from an attacking point of view to go and win the game?
“I always felt if we got the first goal we’d win comfortably. I think the game played out like that, but you can’t miss the level of the chances we missed today away in League Two and win three points.
“We don’t look at one miss, we look at overall in the final third from one o’clock today, did we do enough? And the answer’s possibly not. We go away disappointed.”
The former Rotherham United manager praised the performance of loanee Hayden White, who put in an assured performance after just one training session with his new team-mates.
“He’s a good player. To only meet the lads yesterday for the first time, to go into a back five and be as controlled as he was [is a credit to him].
“He makes the best chance of the game, the defender for County switches off and Hayden takes advantage of that. He’s probably come from a club where there’s three or four lads up front who would’ve stuck that in without thinking.”
The boss finished by praising the travelling support of 3,485, who out-sung their Notts’ counterparts for much of the match.
“I must say it was a wonderful travelling support. For long periods of the game, you only heard the Mansfield Town fans and to be fair to Notts County's fans, they’ve turned out in big numbers today in backing the new ownership and Kevin.”
Supporters will be able to view manager Steve Evans’ post-Notts County interview on Stags PlayerHD later this evening.
