Chesterfield assistant manager Danny Webb felt his side’s 1-1 draw against Gillingham keeps their hopes of making the play-offs alive.
Elliott Nevitt put the visitors ahead but Chesterfield hit back to level through Will Grigg’s 77th-minute goal and lie 10th, six points outside the top seven.
Webb said: “Initially, very, very disappointed with the fact you’re going in at half-time 1-0 down at home. It’s pretty much a must-win, I suppose, before the game. More of a must-not-lose, I think – that’s the positive.
“You come back and get a point against a well-organised team full of good players. Gareth (Ainsworth)’s come in, obviously organised them and they defended very well.
“You’re hoping that eventually the door gets bashed down and it did through a great bit of work from Ryan (Colclough) and ‘Griggy’, great finish.
“Fair play to Gillingham, they defended ever so well, but the second-half performance was a lot better than the first, that’s for sure.
“We wanted to win. We think if we lost, we can wave goodbye to the play-off dream, so to speak. We’ll keep that dream alive.
“Last few seasons especially, we’ve had loads of stuff go our way. The ball would have dropped off, we would have scored 94th minute, we won every week. It’s never going to be that easy this year.
“A point is not ideal but it’s better than nothing.”
Gills boss Ainsworth, who has drawn his first four games in charge of the club, praised his players.
He said: “Another draw, really, really pleased with the boys. This is a really tough place to come.
“I know it’s four draws, but three away trips, overnight trips against tough teams.
“We’ve really messed up a few play-off charges, with Chesterfield and Salford and Colchester at home – and that home game, how we didn’t win it… so that would have been a cracking start.
“But I just want to say that the boys are now realising what I’m all about, what I expect on a pitch, and they are absolutely giving everything.
“We had a formation we worked on on the video. Again, we’ve had no time on the grass because of this fixture schedule. They’ve taken the information in brilliantly.
“We changed just before kick-off because I thought Chesterfield had changed, but as it happens, they hadn’t, so we changed back to our original plan. I was screaming, ‘original plan’, onto the pitch and the boys adapted so well.
“We really took the first half to them. I thought we were a better team, I thought we controlled the ball better. We had some great chances first half.
“We frustrated them, we really did. We soaked up a lot of pressure and but for that tiny moment, we’d have had a great win tonight.”
