Dale hope dampened by double pen woe
ROCHDALE manager Keith Hill believes a lack of discipline cost his side as they suffered defeat away to Oxford and dropped back into the relegation zone.
Dale had taken the lead through Bradden Inman only for Callum Camps to concede two penalties scored by John Mousinho and Todd Kane.
Hill said: “We went in front and we’ve got to be focused but we celebrated for too long and I’m disappointed by the lack of discipline by the whole team at that point.
“It’s now out of our hands going into the final game. We can only dictate what we can do, but we should never have got into the situation we’re in.
“The lads have done superbly well to get out of the drop zone and to throw it away with two penalties is really disappointing.”
In an even and fairly uneventful first half, Oxford goalkeeper Simon Eastwood pulled off a fantastic save to deny Calvin Andrew after good work from Matt Done.
Rochdale goalkeeper Josh Lillis made an important save with his feet to keep Jon Obika out from Wes Thomas’ pull-back.
The game turned in the space of two secondhalf minutes around the hour-mark, with Inman finding space to fire into the bottom corner in the 59th minute.
Two minutes later Oxford were given a chance to get straight back into the game when Camps bundled Joe Rothwell over in the box.
Defender John Mousinho fired his spot-kick into the top right-hand corner to draw level.
Rochdale looked to be picking up a vital point in their fight against survival until the 82nd minute when Camps again conceded a penalty, this time putting sub Rob Hall under too much pressure. A different taker, but the same result for Oxford as Kane stepped up to send Lillis the wrong way from the spot.
And U’s manager Karl Robinson was delighted with the character shown by his team to come from behind.
Robinson said: “I think the most important thing was that the players delivered.
“There was some pressure on us, particularly when we went behind but I think we showed a calmness not to let the worry get to us.
“There’s still some lack of confidence in the squad and that was shown by two defenders stepping up to take the penalties.
“I think that we’ve given the fans a little spring in their step and something to look forward to next season.”