Steve Evans said there were no excuses for not beating Bristol Rovers at home - after Stevenage squandered a two-goal first-half lead.

Kane Hemmings and Jake Forster-Caskey got the goals inside the opening 25 minutes when Boro threatened to run rampant.

Rovers did pull one back in the first period but it was two goals in six minutes midway through the second half that sunk them and gave Rovers a 3-2 victory.

It means Boro have claimed just one point from the last three games, losing both of their home matches, and dropped out of the League play-off places.

Evans said: "We all know we should beat Reading, we all know we should win at Port Vale bar an atrocious decision. 

"There are no excuses tonight. We are in total command of the game, we should be sitting with nine points from nine but instead it is one from nine. 

"And the ramifications of that are we drop outside of that top group. That's the reality of it. 

"We know we are in a run of games but this run, Reading here, Port Vale away and now Bristol Rovers, we should win, as simple as that, and we should expect to win. 

"We’ll take nothing from this other than we’ve lost so we’ll get prepared and ready to go to Derby. 

"But we will never be defeaters, we'll fight as long as we can.  

"We'll still have a game [in hand] to play here that would put us back in that play-off group and we shouldn't forget how far we've come.  

"This time last year we had a little buffering if you like, in terms of few games.  

"We've had it this year so we just need to learn from that." 

The latest contest left many in the crowd annoyed, the Boro boss one of them.

He said: "We just got a little bit complacent, or a lot complacent didn’t we? 

"They get the goal completely against the run of play to bring themselves back in the game.  

"But we’d started on the front foot, we were very comfortable at half-time and I think we are comfortable at the start of the second half, there's no issues. 

"Then there’s a big decision, the boy Evans, who is a really good player, scores a great goal, but he should be off. 

"He's committed a number of fouls but particularly one on the edge of their box. 

"But it's fair to say that in the second half, we were way off the pace. 

"Whether that was just the shock of them getting the goals [I don’t know but] they were simply not in the game. 

"We missed four or five big chances, and a couple more on top of that. We’ve had total dominance. 

"They’ve been in our box six times and scored three goals. 

"The third goal is a great strike and we should be closing it down but he’s put it where no goalkeeper in the world saves it. 

"It's the other two goals that I’m more disappointed with. 

"We send someone inside for the first, and it's a good finish from the boy Thomas into the far corner. 

"Then for the second, central defensively, we shouldn't let Chris Martin across the near post but we do. 

"I don't know whether it's a little chink in the chain when we're so far in command of games, do we take our foot off it a little bit and do we not put the game to bed? 

"We’re unlucky not to be 3-0 up at half-time instead of 2-1, maybe even more. 

"But we don't take those chances and when it goes 2-1 and 2-2, the momentum goes with the team that's come from 2-0 down."