Pompey approached the Easter weekend with fans dreaming of a burst into the play-off reckoning.
But a run of four successive draws has dashed those hopes – on a realistic level, if not quite yet mathematically.
Marlon Pack opened the scoring with a stunning free-kick in the latest stalemate at Oxford, only for Sam Long to head home the equaliser.
And Joe Rafferty is disappointed that the Blues are not heading into the final three fixtures of the season looking for an exciting conclusion.
The defender said: “We’re all frustrated because you get your hopes up a bit and look at what could happen, but it hasn’t panned out.
“You look at the game with Morecambe that we should be winning or MK Dons when we were playing well, then had the sending off.
"We’re all frustrated because you get your hopes up a bit and look at what could happen, but it hasn’t panned out."
“Two wins there and a draw at Oxford actually looks like a really good point, so it’s been quite hard for us.
“It probably wasn’t good enough overall, albeit at a place that’s difficult to come to and they really should be higher in the table.
“We know we’ve got to be better all over the pitch, although it was a brilliant strike from Marlon – he’s got that quality.
“It was a great header from an awkward angle for the equaliser, but it looks terrible to have a free header from a corner and we managed to sort it out after that.
“It was frustrating that we weren’t able to support Colby enough and he was playing off scraps a lot of the time. The balls into him – including some of mine – weren’t good enough.
“I know the fans were getting frustrated at times and that’s fair enough, but sometimes we need to be more patient on the ball and work it around.”