DARREN CURRIE could not hide his disappointment after Dagenham & Redbridge threw away three points at home to Walsall on Saturday.

The veteran midfielder gave the Daggers the lead in the first half with a well placed header, but Martin Devaney struck five minutes into the second period to earn a point for the Saddlers.

Both teams are in the League One drop zone, with Walsall better placed owing to a superior goal difference. Despite only suffering one defeat from six games at Victoria Road this season, Currie believes his team have to turn home draws into wins if they want to escape the relegation trap door.

“We’ve played better, there’s no doubt about that, but we’ve played well enough to win the game, so the natural frustration in the changing room is that we haven’t won the game,” said the former Ipswich Town player.

“Their keeper (Jonny Brain) made a couple of cracking saves to keep them in it and it’s a fairly cheap goal that we’ve given them, so it’s just frustrating.

“We know that it’s important to win our home games, so there is an air of frustration and disappointment that we haven’t won the game today.

At half-time the feeling was we could play better, it was a bit scrappy and we knew there was a battle to be won and they were up for a fight and a scrap and they were quite happy to put their foot in.”

Dagenham & Redbridge have claimed seven points from last six games, including one win, four draws and a loss. One win would take them out of the League One basement and a couple of victories would see them climb to midtable.

With this in mind Currie is confident his team-mates have what it takes to survive their first campaign at English football’s third tier, but knows further missed opportunities – like Saturday’s – could prove fatal.

There’s enough quality in this squad to keep us up, without a doubt, that’s one defeat in six now so we know that we are going to have to be at our best and we certainly know that we are going to have to make our home games crucial, that adds to why we’re disappointed today (Saturday) that we’ve only drawn, so it is two points dropped today, so we’re disappointed,” said the 35-year-old.

Despite tasting the disappointment of a draw there was personal job for Currie who scored his first goal for the goal. Unusually the ball playing conductor found the net with this head – a rarity in his l7 year career.

“It was a nice bit of build up play, a good ball down the channel and Bas (Savage) did his job well, he pinned his man back and protected it, then played a nice little ball back to Greeny (Danny Green) and he’s put in a smashing ball and I’m fortunate that I made a run across the front of my man and it’s landed right on my head,” said the former Wycombe Wanderers player.

“I don’t get many headers, I think it was about my second or third. When you do something you’re not expected to do it makes it a bit more special, so I’m obviously pleased with the goal and that it gave us the lead, but I’m disappointed that we didn’t go on and win.”