Dean Smith happy with Walsall's response
Walsall boss Dean Smith was delighted with the way his players bounced back from last week's humbling at Barnsley as they held promotion-chasing Milton Keynes Dons.
The Saddlers shaded proceedings and led early through Tom Bradshaw's 16th goal of the season, only for it to be cancelled out by former Walsall striker Will Grigg.
Saddlers skipper Adam Chambers had a second half header cleared off the line as Walsall - who handed Sam Mantom a first start of the season after a knee injury - had the better opportunities to find a winner.
And Smith said: "Based on the second half, I think we were a little bit unfortunate not to win the game.
"As the first half grew on, I thought they got stronger. But the second half was a lot more like us.
"Tom's goal was a good goal, a good header and he's deserved that over the last few weeks as he's worked his socks off.
"We started the game really well, took the lead and for 10-15 minutes I thought we were the better team.
"Then they scored, they will see it as a good goal for them and we will see it as a sloppy goal for us.
"I thought when they scored, they got a little bit stronger but we got in at half-time and had a chat and I thought second half we were good value.
"We had spoke about going back to basics and becoming hard to beat and defensively I thought we were excellent today.
"Without the ball, you have to be very good in this league and we were today and restricted a team that is usually free-scoring to few efforts."
