GARY Bowyer admitted there was ‘an air of disappointment’ in the Blackburn Rovers dressing room after their 1-1 draw at Brighton & Hove Albion.

Red-hot Rudy Gestede scored his 10th goal of the season to earn Rovers a draw that extended their unbeaten run to seven matches and left them seventh in the Championship standings, one point behind the play-offs, going into the intentional break.

However the feeling among the players was that it was a game they should have won.

Their manager, however, believed they should not to be too hard on themselves.

“It is never an easy place to come and we weren’t fooled by their league position before the game,” said Rovers boss Bowyer, who was unhappy with his side’s defending from the corner that led to Gary Gardner opening the scoring on the stroke of half-time.

 “They are a good team, they keep the ball well and we knew it was going to be difficult.

“But I thought we applied ourselves well, it has been a tough week for us, what with travelling down to Millwall and back on Tuesday night and then down to Brighton.

“So overall I am satisfied and I think the measure of how far we’ve come is that the group are sat there in the dressing room with only a point.

“There’s an air of disappointment in there, so the mentality is great, but we had to explain to them they’re not going to win every game, you have to respect the point and it’s a good point away from home.”

Saturday’s match was the first time that Rovers striker Jordan Rhodes had not started a league game since January 18.

Bowyer confirmed his decision to bench Rhodes and go with a five-man midfield was purely tactical.

“It’s a squad game, people tire and you have to take that into consideration, and we knew that if we gave too much of the pitch to Brighton, they could hurt us, so we tried to make sure we didn’t,” said Bowyer, who described Gestede’s equaliser as an ‘unbelievable header’ from a ‘wonderful’ Markus Olsson cross.

“It was difficult to leave Jordan out but no different to leaving Rudy Gestede out at Nottingham Forest.”

Brighton, losing play-off semi-finalists for the past two seasons, came into the game on the back of a 1-0 home win over fellow strugglers Wigan Athletic.

But their fifth draw in nine matches at the Amex Stadium has left them just one point above the relegation places.

Seagulls boss Sami Hyypia said: “We deserved more but sometimes in football you don’t get what you deserve.

“We’re looking a little bit more solid and have defended a little better but our attacking play is not the way it was.”

Brighton finished the match in the ascendency and Jason Steele was forced to make a scrambling save from Joe Bennett.

But the closest either side came to a winner was when Rovers captain and man-of-the-match Grant Hanley sent a free header wide of the post.

Bowyer, who was missing defender Matt Kilgallon through injury, said: “We’re disappointed not to get three points and are still looking at how Grant Hanley has not scored.

“We knew it would be a tough game as Sami has got them playing a good brand of football.

“But in the second half we really put the pedal down and were impressive.”