GRAHAM Alexander voiced City’s frustration over the “goal” that never was against Salford.

Andy Cook thought he had scored a second-half winner at Valley Parade but his shot was cleared off the line by defender Stefan Negru.

Replays and pictures of the incident, though, suggested the ball was already in.

Alexander said: “It is over the line and that’s what’s disappointing.

“It’s a difficult job officiating games and the speed of it. But the attack wasn’t a breakaway, the officials were up there and certainly the linesman.

“It’s a bit of a distance and he hasn’t seen it so what can we do?

“These things happen over the course of a season but it would have been an important one because obviously it would have won us the game.

“I was really happy with the second half performance because we showed our strength and quality and should have got our just rewards.”

Goalline technology is available in the Premier League and Alexander would love to see it rolled out to cover all four divisions.

“I would say it’s reasonably easy to supply and fit. It’s definite – it’s not like the circus you get around VAR sometimes.

“But we haven’t got it, so we have to suck it up.”

City found it tough in the first half but picked it up after the break in their goalless opening home game of the season.

“We have to respect every opponent that comes here,” added Alexander. “Not to the point where we regress our performance but we’re not going to be 3-0 up after 20 minutes.

“But I was delighted with the team for not giving anything away in that time like a cheap or an early goal to put us further under the cosh.

“We stayed strong until half-time. We didn’t perform particularly well in possession, we lost our way positionally.

“I sat the players down and we talked about what we do well and we saw the results of that in the second half. Looking at the pictures, we should have won 1-0.”

Bobby Pointon and Clarke Oduor came on in the second half with Olly Sanderson also making his debut but Jamie Walker was an unused substitute.

Alexander said: “I felt Tyreik (Wright) and Patto (Alex Pattison) were tiring a little bit, which is understandable. It only takes a little percentage to come off their dynamism because they are the most dynamic players we have.

“We brought on Bobby and Clarke to give us that extra energy and Olly and I thought the performance was really strong.

“The players that we had on there are all regular goal-scorers. There is a case of having enough goal threat on there without being ridiculous.

“Sarce (Antoni Sarcevic) had a brilliant chance with the save the keeper made.

“I’ve got good players and I’ll judge them off their training, how they’ve played previously and all those things. But nobody can look at that and think we didn’t try to win it.”

Jake Young was replaced by Tyler Smith on the bench but Alexander stressed that it was a selection decision and not down to any fresh transfer movement.