Football Season Review

Last season, Rochdale were expected to battle against the drop, but surpassed all expectations, only narrowly missing out on the Play-Offs. The key men in their impressive campaign were their top scorer Garry Jones, their second top scorer Craig Dawson, striker Chris O'Grady, who was immense with his build up play, and manager Keith Hill. With all of these men and Hill leaving the club over the summer, the Dale were always going to struggle to match last season's heroics, and the signing of unproven manager Steve Eyre raised a lot of eyebrows among the fans. These fears became only bigger after the season started, the Dale struggled throughout the campaign, and rarely looked like a side capable of competing in the division, never mind battling for a top half place. Problems were evident on both ends of the pitch, the defence was leaky throughout the campaign, and there was never a constant source of goals, with Jones being no where near the level he was on last season and Ashley Grimes struggled to rediscover his early season form. Eyre was shown the door in January, and his replacement John Coleman enjoyed a brief honeymoon period before it became obvious that the Rochdale squad simply isn't good enough to compete on this level. In the end, they were comfortably relegated, and we are yet to see what Coleman can do in League Two, with a full campaign at his disposal to prove himself.

Player of the Season: Jason Kennedy