STUART McCall was relieved to escape the Valley with a point after City survived a second-half onslaught.

The Bantams left Charlton with a 1-1 draw after the recalled Timothee Dieng’s header cancelled out a Jorge Teixeira strike just before the interval.

But having controlled the first half, McCall was unhappy with City’s display after the break as they found themselves hanging on.

McCall admitted: “I’m so disappointed with the second-half performance and it’s not often I’ve had to say that.

“We controlled the first half without a doubt but the final ball could have been better. We never picked anybody out from some good positions so many times.

“But it was a game of two halves. I expected more when we were attacking towards our fans who were outstanding once again.

“I know there was nearly 1,000 of our fans there but it sounded like 5,000 at times. Going into them second half like we have done at Oldham, Northampton and Port Vale, I hoped we would lift it again.

“But Charlton started the second half very strongly and they took a stranglehold on it. They won all the battles we had been winning.

“We were pleased we didn’t concede although we rode our luck a little bit.”

City were the only team in the top five not to win and drop a place to fifth after Scunthorpe’s stoppage-time victory.

McCall was just pleased to take something from the final midweek trip of the season.

“The second half didn’t merit getting a point, although the first did,” he added.

“As much as we’re disappointed with our own performance, and there are no excuses for that, you’ve got to give credit to Charlton who started getting in behind us.

“We’re pleased to get a clean sheet second half. There was no lacking in our work rate but we stopped getting on the ball and playing.”

Alex Jones missed out with injury and will be monitored in the next couple of days to see if he can feature against Swindon on Saturday.

Nicky Law is also due to resume training with the rest of the squad tomorrow.