Jimmy McNulty says that he's pleased his side fought to come back from behind in their 2-2 draw with Tranmere Rovers last night.
Dale went behind following a bizarre own goal in the 19th minute. Eleven minutes after the interval Josh Hawkes converted from the spot for Tranmere to give them a two-goal advantage.
Danny Lloyd pulled one back with just over 20 minutes to play. His corner was then headed home from close range by Ethan Ebanks-Landell in the third minute of injury time.
Jimmy McNulty says that he's pleased to see his side come back from behind again, especially after how the opposing goals came about.
"Pleased with a point. Pleased to come back from behind again, two goals behind tonight. In what I feel was real adversity. The nature of the first goal to start with, when I watched it live, I thought it seemed really bizarre. I didn’t really know how it had gone in, it was strange to me," said McNulty.
"I thought at first Rich O’Donnell had taken a bad touch. I knew the ball was travelling towards the outside line of the goal when it was passed back to him, and I thought he’d taken a bad touch with the outside of his foot."
"Only when I got into the changing room he told me, and the rest of the players told me that Rich never even took a touch. It actually hit the rugby post holder in the ground, there’s a little rubber lip that sticks up slightly above the ground. Rich has told me, and the players have told me that it deviates off that rubber on its way back to him and goes into the back of the net."
"Which, if you had seen my expression at pitchside when that goal went in, I was puzzled by it, it didn’t seem right in the moment."
"Upon learning that, you shouldn’t laugh but I almost had to laugh because I thought, how else can we be tested in this spell? We’re bottom of the football league, facing real adversity. How else can we be tested? And that was almost my message to the players because I thought it was really hostile tonight, it was difficult for the players to play."
"When we went 1-0 down, the ground was very agitated, but the players kept trying to do it in a way that we think is the best way for us or in a way that can work."
"And then we faced another decision that we thought was incorrect. We’ve seen that one back, Jimmy Keohane clearly pokes the ball away from the lad. The ref apologized to me at the end of the game when I think he felt the gravity of the decision he’s made is probably an incorrect one. There was no argument from their bench either.
"And we face a penalty and we’re 2-0 down. So, a really bizarre first goal, an incorrect decision for the second goal. Forgiveness on the incorrect decision, referees make wrong calls just like we do. Those things happen in football, but the first goal was really bizarre."
"It provided real adversity for us to try and overcome, and the fact that the players did come back from that and get a 2-2 draw in a really tough environment tonight, I think it just shows how much fight the players have got and I’m really proud of them to actually come back and get something out of that and then keep fighting on, keep fighting for another week."
Watch the full interview with McNulty below via our official YouTube channel.