Tuesday night’s goalless draw with Maritzburg United has seen the team go four matches without a win in the Absa Premiership.
The Port Elizabeth-based Chilli Boys last conjured up a victory in September, when they beat Baroka 1-0.
Chippa are now 12th on the log with 10 points from 11 matches.
The team have another shot at bagging three points this week when they host Amazulu at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium on Friday (8pm).
But the former Super Sport United mentor said playing Usuthu would not be easy.
“Right now it’s a dog fight, all the games are dog fights,” Tinkler said.
“It is not going to be easy at home.
“I have watched [Amazulu] in quite a few games now.
“We only have two days to prep but we need to be ready for them,” he said.
“I think our confidence levels are a lot higher. We can still say it’s two decent results that we have had.
“I look at the last five games – do we deserve to be where we are right now?
“I don’t think we do, but you can’t be saying that week in, week out.
“People judge us coaches on points, not on performances and that is the harsh reality.”
Speaking after Tuesday night’s match, Tinkler said his team deserved way better than just a point against the Team of Choice.
Despite the outcome, the coach said he was happy with his players’ performance.
“I am proud of the boys. I thought they worked hard, followed the game plan and the strategy worked.
“But like against Chiefs, as much as I am happy with the point, I see it as a two-point drop because we should have beaten Chiefs.
“We deserved to beat Chiefs. I feel the same [of] Maritzburg.
“We could have won this game. We should have had three points which would have made a huge difference in our life right now,” he said.
“We knew coming here it was going to be a very difficult game because Maritzburg is a hard-working team – lots of energy, a lot of speed, especially on the transitional play, players with a good understanding of the formation and the strategy.
“We needed to be highly disciplined defensively and to match them in all areas.
“They were looking to find [Mohau] Mokate in behind [Thato] Mokeke – you could see that was a ploy because his aerial ability is not great, but Mokate is and they caught us twice.
“Thato was relying on the ball to bounce. We said ‘no, rather attack it’, and it was important to look at supporting him quickly.
“I thought we had done that in the second half.
“They didn’t really hurt us in that aspect of the game.
“I thought we created better chances.”