David Artell was pleased with his side’s overall performance at Gigg Lane this afternoon. A much improved display from the Railwaymen saw Brad Walker open the scoring with an early header before Jermaine Beckford headed an equaliser with five minutes remaining.

The Alex boss told the club’s official web-site: “There were more certainly some real positives from today and it was much improved from Barrow that’s for sure. Although results are not important in pre-season, we should have won with the chances we had. We dominated the first half and should have been more than the one goal we did score.

“We need to be more ruthless on that score and we should have been more than one goal up entering the last stages of the game. It was disappointing to concede with five minutes left but Beckford has been around and it was a great ball in. He managed to get a touch on it a bit like Brad did us in the first half.

“I was pleased with the way we performed and we defended well. We had the better of the chances and we just tired in the last 10/15 minutes but that fitness will come. We are getting there and we will get there.”

The Crewe boss also revealed that striker Chris Porter was not risked after reporting a slight tweak in the warm-up. He was replaced by Tommy Lowery.

Dave told the club’s official web-site: “Chris said he felt something in the warm-up but wanted to play. I told him we were not prepared to risk him and Tom stepped in. It wasn’t worth risking and Chris understood that.”