By Richard Harvey

Dover boss Mitch Brundle’s disappointment over their goalless draw with Chelmsford was a measure of their progress in recent weeks.

It was a game Dover could have won in National League South on Saturday but they were happy with a point to extend their unbeaten run to three games.

“I didn’t think we played particularly well,” said Brundle. “I’m a little bit disappointed but that shows you where we’ve come from, unbeaten in three and five points from the last nine.

“They’re higher than us. You can be critical but to be fair the boys did everything in terms of their work-rate, commitment and desire that we look for.

“I’m quite pleased but I also feel like it was a missed opportunity.

“It’s a bit frustrating because we did well in spells, I thought we deserved to win the game. Credit to them, they are resilient as a team but we were as well.

“A couple of months ago we might have lost that game with the chances late on. I thought defensively, especially the two centre-halves, were excellent.

“We huffed and puffed and lacked that real clinical edge.”

Striker Joshua Ajayi nearly gave Dover a first-minute lead at Crabble, and Brundle knew it would have shaped into a different contest had that one gone in.

“You score that one, you like to hope you kick on,” said the Dover boss. “We put ourselves in good areas but we just weren’t clinical enough.

“We’re creating chances but it comes down to the saying ‘if you don’t finish your dinner, you’re going to be hungry’.

“We can’t be critical of the team. They didn’t out-work us, it was a good battle between two good teams. We want to be in their position so go out and prove it.

“If we can keep the run going then we’ll keep moving forward.”

It was, nonetheless, another step on the road to a more consistent Dover level of performance under Brundle.

“You’re just trying to get performances back to back,” he added.

“Consistency has been our big problem, today it wasn’t so that’s credit to the dressing room. It can’t just be two games, it needs to be three and then four and five.

“At the minute we’re not at that stage, we’re still developing and building and still trying to get as many points on the board as we can.”