Blackpool boss Simon Grayson praises Armand Gnanduillet for his reaction to being dropped at Burton Albion

Pool’s top scorer was named on the bench for Saturday’s goalless draw against Burton Albion.

But the Frenchman responded in the right way, producing a strong display off the bench having been brought on soon after Curtis Tilt’s red card.

Grayson, who said Gnanduillet was dropped because of his poor performance in the Seasiders’ midweek draw against Wycombe Wanderers, was happy with his striker’s reaction.

He said: “I didn’t think he played well enough the other night but there were one or two other players who might have been left out.

“We looked at the game the other night and it was too easy at times to play the ball up to Armand and take the easy opportunity.

“We wanted to get another midfielder into the middle of the pitch where we thought Burton would be strong anyway.

“We played Del (Nathan Delfouneso) up there on his own or down the sides and linking up with Liam (Feeney) and Sullay (Kaikai) as well as Jordan (Thompson) as a number 10.

“You mix games up with personnel and Armand reacted in a good manner when he came on and was a handful. I want to see more of that from him.”

Gnanduillet came within a whisker of winning the game for the 10 men of Blackpool, clipping the outside of the post with a lofted effort in the 89th minute.

That would have been the perfect way to cap off a battling performance from Grayson’s men, who were forced to play with a man down for more than half an hour.

The Seasiders did the ugly side of the game very well in torrential conditions at the Pirelli Stadium, the defenders putting their bodies on the line time and again for a fifth clean sheet of the season.

“You have to dig deep, you can’t go and be expansive,” Grayson said of Blackpool’s approach after going a man down.

“We had one or two decent opportunities on the counter, not just Armand’s, there were others.

“First half we think we should do a little bit better because we had a couple of decent opportunities.

“Del had an opportunity from a ball in from Liam from the right and Matty (Virtue) had a chance as well.

“We created some chances but we’ve still got to be a little bit better with and without the ball.

“When we got the ball we were a little bit too slow in our transition period and we wasted some opportunities when we won it back.

“We’ve been talking about this for the last few weeks now.

“We’ve got to make sure when we get a chance, we capitalise on opportunities because we’ve got some good players.

“It’s about making the right pass at the right time and executing the cross or run properly.

“We have to be on the front foot more, look to pass forward more and get more runners. We saw glimpses of it but we still have to be better.”