Manager Keith Hill delivers an honest assessment of Dale’s 3-2 defeat away at Shrewsbury Town…
“We didn’t turn up defensively as a team,” he told iFollow.
“When we went 1-0 up, I thought we should probably have gone 2-0 up but then we allowed the opposition to get back on level terms by not defending properly.
“I thought we were very poor defensively in the first half. We knew we had to bring our attacking intent and I thought that looked quite well.
“We had five defensive players out there and we conceded two goals in the first half and it could have been more, but fair play to the lads who played up front because we looked a real danger and a real threat, and arguably we should have converted more opportunities.
“We had an illness just before the start of the game in Reece Brown who was due to play so we had to change things when we got to the stadium. Josh Lillis got injured during the week and I thought Brendan [Moore] was superb but he didn’t get the protection he deserved.
“The defending today was poor and I really expected more. I had to change it at half time and I took a massive gamble with using all of our substitutions having already made one with Callum Camps getting injured.
“I’m really concerned because there seems to be an apathy to it all. ‘Well we got going last season, so it’s just a matter of time’, but it isn’t. You’ve got to stick to the principles and the way that you do things. You’ve got to see players do what’s expected of them, and I didn’t see that today, especially defensively.
“I’m disappointed that we’ve lost the game when we could have drawn it and conceivably won it, and that’s a real worry for me as a manager.”
Watch the full interview on iFollow.