TRANMERE’S best sequence of the season ran out of legs on Saturday but there was no reason to believe they left any confidence behind in the mud of rain-soaked London Road.

Les Parry’s team could feel genuinely hard done by to be narrowly beaten by the most talented and prolific attacking side in League One.

Peterborough claimed the three points thanks to a disputed strike by Grant McCann on 53 minutes and an Enoch Showunmi own goal on 70 minutes, after Rovers had led at the interval through John Welsh’s 24th-minute effort.

If Tranmere had taken more than a single goal lead from a strong and assertive first performance, they might have gone on to secure a fifth away win of the campaign. Their performance over 90 minutes was good enough to merit a point

They had opportunities to inflict further first half punishment on a Posh defence that invariably offers the opposition some encouragement. But they did not take them.

The visitors also regretted backing off in anticipation of a fired up response from Peterborough at the start of the second half. The backlash duly arrived and led to a an equaliser within eight minutes.

From that point on Tranmere had to work ever harder to suppress the talents of Craig Mackail-Smith, George Boyd and Lee Tomlin as the Posh became more effective for putting aside their pass and move philosophy in favour of a more direct style.

Manager Darren Ferguson confessed afterwards that he picked a lineup around his best ballplayers on Friday afternoon – before 15 hours of incessant rain turned the London Road pitch into a quagmire.

The two managers agreed that referee Grant Hegley made the right decision in allowing the game to go ahead. The heavy rain ceased just after 1pm, leaving conditions that made it difficult to move the ball across the surface – but not impossible.

Peterborough had most difficulty in adapting during the first 45 minutes. “We could not play with the tempo we wanted,” Ferguson said. “We want to play in a particular way to win games but you sometimes have to go away from that philosophy.

“We tried to play too much football in the first half. But we showed we have players to win games in any conditions.”

Peterborough were also unsettled early on by being pressed at every turn by Tranmere. The visitors often looked more confident than the home side in moving the ball in sharp, direct counter attacks during the first half.

Diminutive front man Lateef Elford-Alliyu was able to find better traction on the mud than many of the home side’s ballplayers.