Dale’s six-point survival quest
SIX points from three games for League One survival – that was the target Keith Hill set his players following Saturday’s 1-1 draw against Bradford City.
Dale looked on course to clumb out of the relegation zone for the first time since mid-December with Matt Done’s first-half strike seperating the teams as the game entered the final stages.
But an horrendous dropped catch from goalkeeper Josh Lillis gifted the Bantams a share of the spoils and ensured Dale remained in the bottom four, one point behind Oldham and Walsall and three points behind Wimbledon.
Ahead of last night’s clash against Plymouth at home, Hill said: “It’s all to play for. The games are running out but we’ve been in the bottom four since the twentieth game of the season so we have got to make sure over the next three games that we get the points that we need.
“I am happy with the form we’re in but we now we need six points, no question about that.
“It was a vital error. We have to support Josh, but it was an elementary error. He has taken his eye off the ball – he’s collecting it comfortably and ends up dropping it at the feet of Charlie Wyke, who we’d kept quiet. But Josh will be supported because he has been superb for us. He has saved us in games this season, he’s been a stalwart and has kept the most clean sheets that this club has ever had. I am really happy with his performances.
“Obviously he’s not happy with the mistake but we have to make sure we support him.”
Hill has been realistic in talking about the possibility of relegation but admits to uncertainty over what that would mean for the squad and the club as a whole.
“I don’t know what the ramifications of relegation would be,” he said.
“If you look at Chesterfield being relegated – that is a big club, a wealthy club in comparison to ourselves.
“You just don’t know what relegation brings. You have to fight the negative bounce and when you get relegated there is a lot of negativity.
“The star players that you have insist on leaving. The players here are loyal to me at this moment in time, but when the curtain falls and, if we are relegated, then they will want to leave – they won’t want to play League Two football.
“So it’s a question of trying to build again.
“But if you look at our squad, the amount of players we have under contract, I would insist on all of them staying if they are under contract because I didn’t just offer those contracts at the beginning of last season on extended deals to bail out when the going gets tough. I expected them, like me, to stay through the tough times.”
‘It’s all to play for. We have to make sure that we get the points we need’