David Moyes hailed the attitude, effort and commitment of his players after Everton's 2-2 draw against Aston Villa today.
The Blues' boss admitted a good performance was "tinged with disappointment" after Everton led twice only to be pegged back by Villa.
Moyes gave credit to his countryman Alex McLeish and his side who showed good character to come from behind twice. For Moyes though the game represented a frustrating afternoon of what could have been.
He said: "It was frustrating because our performance probably merited more, but Aston Villa are a good side with good forward players and we always knew it was going to be a tough game.
"In the past people have seen the games here they're always tight and exciting games against Villa and I think today was the same.
"We needed to do better to finish it off, but you have to give Villa credit, their job is to defend as well.
"We missed a couple of chance, I think the play was exciting, we were trying to score good goals, but overall I've not got many problems.
"I'm disappointed that we've lost two goals, one was from 30 yard and another from a cross, but I've got to say I thought today's performance was really good.
Moyes opted for an unfamiliar pairing of Leon Osman and Tim Cahill upfront, a partnership which troubled the Aston Villa defence throughout and worked well for the Blues opener.
Moyes said people who know Cahill's game at the international level will not be surprised at his effectiveness playing as a sole striker.
He said: "Tim plays all his games for Australia as a centre forward now so nobody should really be that surprised (he played there).
"We know he can play a couple of roles but we thought today he was the right man for the job and he had a few chances, led the line quite well.
"Ossie benefited from some good play in the box where he managed to slide on in for him."
Moyes also paid tribute to the fans inside Goodison today after the earlier fans protest against mismanagement at boardroom level.
He said the crowd picked up on Everton's early good play and got behind his side throughout.
"There were three of four players for us who really got on the front foot, got on them and give us a start. And that got the crowd right behind us as well, it's a great place when the crowd are like they were today.
"I think the crowd responded to hoiw well the players had done, especially in that opening period.
"I said after the first game after QPR, the supporters live off what we do on the pitch, we didn't play well against QPR or Blackburn but the boys didn't half play well today.
"It didn't go for us, we made a couple of mistakes defensively, but you couldn't have faulted the attitude effort and commitment that the players showed and I think the crowd picked up on that."
Despite the many positives to come out of the game, effective introductions of Royston Drenthe and Apostolos Vellios being two, Moyes said there is still work to be done with his main aim, winning, not achieved on the day.
He said: "The job is to find a new team, my job is to find a winning team, a team that wins and then from there I can see where to take it.
"First thing is to win the games and today we didn't win. So it's tinged with disappointment but I'm quite pleased with the performance."
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