Jimmy McNulty says he was disappointed with Tuesday’s 3-2 loss at Woking.
Dale took the lead but conceded three after the break to leave the Laithwaite Community Stadium with nothing, despite Kairo Mitchell’s first goal for the Club late on.
The Head Coach says didn’t see enough courage with the ball from his players.
“I’m disappointed with the loss – of course I am,” said McNulty.
“My overriding feeling was that, for most of the game, I didn’t see our team’s courage and personality with the ball.
“In our pre-season games and the first two games of the season, we’ve displayed that courage, but under stress tonight there were large parts of the game where I didn’t recognise us.
“Credit to Woking for that, they put the pressure on, but when it goes 1-1 and we go 2-1 down, I finally started to see some of the stuff that we’ve been implementing.
“I was gutted with the result but also equally gutted with how we didn’t try to play our way when the pressure came on.
“I thought we lacked that courage with the ball that I’ve seen us grow in the previous games so far.”
Dale made four changes to the starting line-up from Saturday’s 1-0 win at Oxford City, with match winner Ian Henderson suffering with an injury, as well as Tommy McDermott.
“Some of the changes were enforced. Hendo was carrying a horrible ankle injury and fair play to him to be willing to come down here for the team and sit on the bench, loaded up with pain killers.
“He tried his best for the team late on. We’re without Dev [Devante Rodney] who is ill and Hendo wasn’t available start, so we only had Kairo [Mitchell] available as a striker.
“We had to be inventive with the team in that regard, playing Harvey [Gilmour] off the striker, who I thought did very well.
We brought Easty [Ryan East] into the team and then freshened up at the back. We brought Kwakes [Kwaku Oduroh] in and took out Cam [Cameron John], and also put Kyle [Ferguson] in who has been training strong.
It just felt like the right time for George [Nevett] to come out, who is only 17. It’s been hugely for him, physically and emotionally, and we just thought this would be a stressful test.
“The subs we made in game; Kyle began to flag physically, and it felt right to get George back out there for his passing ability late on, when I thought we finally started playing our way.”
McNulty says he will be looking for a reaction from his players now, ahead of Saturday’s visit of Eastleigh.
“I just want to see our team – the way we do things. I want to see that again.
“Tonight was good evidence for them that, if we go away from what we do, and we try and get into a basic fight with the opposition, the game can become anyone’s.
“We need to try and make the game ours as much as possible. That’s what I’ll be looking for.”
Watch the full interview with McNulty below via our official YouTube channel.