Simon Grayson: Portsmouth draw with Blackpool a fair result

And the Bloomfield Road boss believes the point underlines the progress the club has made over the summer.

Kenny Jackett’s men were unable to condemn the high-flying Seasiders to their first League One defeat of the season on Saturday.

Marcus Harness opened the scoring in the 17th minute as the visitors dominated the first half.

Blackpool came out stronger in the second period, though, and Armand Gnaduillet equalised on 58 minutes.

Both sides had opportunities to win the game, with Gnaduillet glancing a header wide and John Marquis having a close-range effort saved.

And Grayson had no complaints the spoils were shared.

He told the Blackpool Gazette: ‘We would have liked to have won the game but we were up against a strong Portsmouth side.

‘They’ve got people like John Marquis up front and strength in depth in their squad, so this was going to be a benchmark for us in terms of how far we’ve come as a club.

‘I think it was a fair result in the end.

‘I thought first 10 or 15 minutes we played quite well and we got off to a real, strong start. We got on the front foot and limited them to a few opportunities.

‘But from then on we were a bit sloppy and possibly complacent. We were slow in possession and slow in stopping the opposition.’

Pompey’s goal came through a mistake from Curtis Tilt after he was robbed of possession by John Marquis before Harness finished.

Later in the half, Marquis then caught out Ryan Edwards, who picked up a booking for dragging the Blues striker back.

They were errors Grayson doesn’t expect his players to make a lot this term.

He added: ‘Defenders make mistakes and when they do, they probably get punished and highlighted more.

‘There were probably one or two players who made more mistakes in that first half than they have done for large parts of the season.

‘But as long as they’re trying to do the right things then I don’t have any complaints with it.’