Hill lays down cup challenge
KEITH Hill will be urging his Rochdale players to develop a winning habit as they tackle two cup ties in the next four days.
Having started to turn a corner after a difficult start to the League One campaign, Dale attention turns to the Emirates FA Cup today and then the Checkatrade Trophy on Tuesday.
Bromley, seventh in the Vanarama National League, provide the opposition at the Crown Oil Arena this afternoon for a first round FA Cup tie before Blackburn head to town for a midweek clash.
Hill said cup competitions bring a different kind of pressure to the league programme – but the benefits of a positive cup result can have knock on effects
“There are a lot of pressures and stresses in the game, but there are different types of pressure going into the two cup games,” he said. “You could say that the football world will be looking at the weekend’s game as a potential upset against Bromley, but it’s something we will take very seriously.
“We were successful last season having nearly gone out of the competition at Maidstone United, where we were able to turn a negative into a positive and that gave us a great run in the FA Cup.”
One thing Hill is determined to enforce is a respect for today’s opponents.
“Bromley are doing very well and if you look at the National League it’s a very strong league full of ex professional and wannabe professional players, and wannabe professional football clubs and owners,” he said.
“You are getting a lot of clubs being bought by wealthy businessmen and they are doing everything they can to establish the club they have bought into the Football League pyramid. It’s happening on a regular basis and the league is getting stronger.
“There’s the likes of Wrexham and Tranmere, big clubs who have been in the Championship.
“So it is a very strong league and we will be very respectful of Bromley.”
Joe Bunney and MJ Williams – regular starters in the Dale side of late – both miss today’s clash, offering an opportunity for others to come in a stake their claim.
“The psychology of a footballer is that, if you are not playing, you tend to be a better player on the training ground where there is less pressure,” said Hill.
“But the pressure comes when these players are called on to perform.
“I have a great belief in these players but they have to believe in themselves and they have to get the recognition from the players who are playing regularly, and I feel I’m getting that now.
“What I’m seeing is better training from players who have arrived late and players who haven’t integrated well over the course of pre-season. They are now intergrated and accepted and we are getting better performances from those players on the training pitch so that leads me to believe that, when they are called upon, we’ll get improvement in matchday performances.”
Hill added that performances in general had improved and he is confident the side will soon start to turn draws into wins when it comes to the League One campaign.
“Performances lead me to believe that we will start to turn draws into wins but we have to tweak one or two things and we have been highlighting that to the players,” he said.
“But if you are not going to win a match, then don’t lose it because you don’t want the losing column to read nine or ten defeats as it could do at this time of the season and then you are in real trouble.
“You have got to pick up points and once it becomes better then you start to pick up three points.
“I genuinely believe that will soon change. The way that we played at Plymouth we were more than good value for victory.
“Whether we have turned the corner or not I’m not sure. I think we were playing similarly last season but winning games. We have been more consistent this season but we haven’t performed to the heights that I expect. But barring one or two real disappointing cave ins against MK Dons and Shrewsbury – other than that, we were well beaten by Blackburn on the day but I have been relatively pleased with a lot of what I’ve seen and I believe we are turning in the right direction. It doesn’t matter how you get there, you just need three points. You don’t want to be going into the last ten games of the season needing to win nine to have a chance to stay up.
“Our priority is to get as many points as we possibly can and almost have games in hand where there is less pressure on you.”