"We're very disappointed, and more than that, justifiably frustrated. We've had enough chances in the last two games here to have won four games, and we haven't won one.

"Again, we played nice football, we spread the play, we made chances and we dominated the game.

"We feel as if we've actually lost this match because it's one we should have won.

"But there's nothing wrong with our football, nothing wrong with our enthusiasm, nothing wrong with our commitment. We're just missing chances."

About Shearer's penalty miss:

"It wasn't quite Alan's day, but I never crib about penalties. He's his own master in that regard. He's taken far more penalties than I have and has had far more success, so he knows a lot more about it than I do.

"Occasionally I speak to him about penalties but I'll leave it to him now to sort it all out. I can tell you that he feels worse than anybody in the club about it, which I understand."

About whether Sorensen's previous save affected Shearer:

"No. All that is water off a duck's back to Alan.

"We know that if he scores the penalty, we win the game. But it's part of football and you have to put aside that disappointment."

About McCann's dismissal:

"His second booking was clear. It was a tackle from behind. He already had a yellow card, so what was he arguing about?"

"I had a good view of it. It was about five yards away from me and the referee's gone into the fracas and he's picked the wrong player out."

"I had a limited amount of money to spend in the summer, felt we needed a good goalkeeper and, for £2 million, I think Sorensen is a steal."

Sorensen commented:

"I've got great respect for him (Shearer,).

"At the end, we just shook hands and he said: 'Well done.' I'm not the type of guy who is a Smart Alec. He's still the striker I hold in the highest esteem.

"But it's déjà vu and I think I've made two sets of supporters happy.''

"On another day, he maybe could have scored two goals. He had a great header in the first half, a few half-chances and the penalty.

"If he took ten penalties, he might score eight. Of course, mind games come into it, and I could sense that he was putting a lot of thought into where he was going to strike it.

"On his run-up, I gave the left side a lot more chance than the right and it went for me. I wasn't trying to psyche him out - I was just trying to read his reactions and luckily it went my way.''

"I'm really settling in and we've got a good team spirit, which we showed here. We need to score a few more goals and if we do that, I can't see us staying in the bottom half too long.''

The end of our second trilogy of home games this season then and while we may not quite be in the throes of depression this time, it's still a long way from days of wine and roses...

Perhaps in retrospect we should be thankful that making the long journey north was the limit of Pompey's ambition, allowing as us they did the opportunity to strut our stuff with the minimum of opposition.

Unfortunately that was then followed by our seemingly-obligatory League Cup disaster, a competition that should be sponsored by Fyfes bananas given our track record of self-inflicted misery.

Speaking personally I've been desperate to win the League Cup every season, but reading again that we're fancied to do well in the competition provokes nowt but a hollow laugh from this quarter.

Our best chance of silverware it may be, but that's like saying that if I enter Eurovision Song Contest I might not come last.

Anyway, as Johnny Logan said, "what's another year" and for Villa's Dublin it was another goal at the Gallowgate, same as the last one last season (see above.)

Villa taking the lead just about put the tin lid on things, after a start in which our every move was foiled by either whistle or flag. Some absolutely farcical decisions were being handed out by re-instated ref Matt Myarse, sorry Messias including yellow cards for Bowyer and Speed on the flimsiest of pretexts.

If anything, the match almost looked at one stage like it was heading for a rerun of that infamous Rennie home game against the same opposition when Shearer was made to walk the plank.

That old righteous indignation though was summoned up from the crowd, who were spurred into a vocal response after yet another of those daft decisions. Unfortunately support ebbed and flowed like the game and more than a few punters had wandered away to seek solace in pies or pints when Robert banged home an equaliser. Serves the buggers right.

At that point it seemed as if we'd revert to the script of a number of last season's home games, of coming from behind after an early setback to claim maximum points.

Certainly Villa seemed to have fallen in to the role of fall guys with the minimum of fuss, failing to consistently threaten us other than when we dwelt on the ball in defence and allowed the visitors to hassle us into unforced errors.

The chances of our winning the game seemed to vastly increase when mackem McCann was rightly dismissed for another scything challenge - the referee having turned into a villain in the eyes of the visitors as his decisions started to balance out, in keeping with the raised desperation levels among those in claret and blue.

That turnaround in fortunes from the whistler was complete when he pointed to the spot to confirm our position as the most prolific penalty earners in the Premiership.

Unfortunately that presented another ex-player from the dark place down the road with the chance to reprise his own success at that end of the ground, and to no great shock (at least in these parts), Shearer was unable to force his spot kick past Sorensen. Sometimes you just have the feeling that it's not going in - like today.

Had big Al scored and secured the expected victory, no doubt the after-match consensus would have been along the lines of "deserved victory" "back on track after the cup" etc. etc. In the event though we're left with a daunting trip to Stamford Bridge that we could easily have made two points better off.

Frustrating though this was, it's difficult to get too angry about a game in which we were on the offensive almost constantly and threatening to score for vast tracts of the game. Contrast that to the gross ineptitude we showed against the likes of Birmingham City on this ground earlier in the season.

It could be argued that we barely deserved the win at Boro a few weeks ago and our inability to beat Villa in some way balanced out the Riverside success as these things sometimes do. I'd still fancy us to go down there again though and depart from Villa Park with the three points.