AFC Wimbledon boss Neal Ardley was left frustrated after his team failed to hold on to a lead and see off lowly Tranmere.

Dons lead 2-1 at half time through goals from Jack Smith and Ade Akinfenwa, but were overrun in the second half where they had to settle for a draw.

“Credit to Tranmere, they had nothing to lose as they’re down at the bottom and scrapping,” said Ardley.

“It’s disappointing not to win, but I never agreed it would be easy just because they were the bottom team (at the start of the day.)

“We were brilliant in the first half and made them look very ordinary. We worked both sides of the pitch brilliantly and I thought we were by far the better team.

“Their first goal was sloppy and came out of nothing - we really should have gone in at half time two or three up.

'Dons were better team' says Ardley

“But I really thought we were excellent in the first half and was disappointed to come in only 2-1 up. There was a bit of an onslaught and there wasn’t too much tactically we could do about it.”

After playing three times in a week, the Dons now have seven days rest before facing Northampton away on Saturday – a break Ardley feels is much needed.

“The week off now has come at the right time," he said. "We’ll be fresh and ready for the next game after the rest.

“The lads have played a lot of football and some of them were dead on their feet at the end of the game.

“It’s not an excuse; you look at it and you see we need legs in the team if we’re playing as positively as we have been.

“Look at the way our fullbacks are linking up with our wingers and tell me that’s not attacking football. But I think it’s shown that the lads were running out of energy after the week they’ve had.”