Dale picked up their first point of the season on Saturday when they drew 1-1 with Hereford United. Chris Dagnall gave Dale the lead, and David Perkins was sent off late on.     

Well, we're off and running at last but the performance left the travelling Dale support concerned as Dale didn't deserve the point they got. 

It wasn't just the Dale performance that was awful either though to be fair as the officials had an absolutely appalling game throughout and one of the many poor decisions leaves Dale without David Perkins for one match as he was given two very harsh yellow cards.  The overall collective performance of the officials made Rob Styles look like Pierluigi Collina.

Keith Hill's team selection certainly raised a few eyebrows and got many people wondering what formation we were actually playing and it was very difficult to tell.  The defence was simple enough with Spencer, Ramsden, Kennedy, Branston and McArdle looking to keep out Hereford but Rundle and Muirhead were dropped with Doolan and Prendergast coming into the side.  Prendergast obviously went over on to the left but we couldn't decide whether Jones was on the right wing in a 4-4-2 or whether Dagnall had dropped to the right in a 4-5-1.  It didn't look like Daggers was playing any deeper than usual and seemed to be playing up alongside Murray with Perkins and Doolan in midfield.

Dale started off alright and looked arguably the better side early on but Hereford looked dangerous every time they broke forward with Lionel Ainsworth proving Football Manager right and being very ace.  He caused all sorts of problems and a shaky looking Dale defence could easily have found themselves conceding more than they did.

The first twenty minutes or so didn't really produce much goalmouth action but Dale actually went ahead just after that.  Chris Dagnall burst into the box and looked to be fouled in the box and the referee pointed to the spot.  From where we were, it looked a penalty but reports from nearer the incident suggest that it was a harsh decision.  Anyway, Daggers took the ball from Jones and placed it brilliantly into the left hand corner of the net sending Brown the wrong way completely making it 1-0 to Rochdale.

The problem then was that that was actually our last effort on target except a Rory Prendergast scuffed shot that was like a backpass to the keeper.

Another problem was that the lead lasted like five minutes or something before a massive boot up field fooled Branston and looped over him and let in Robinson who smashed the ball past Spencer to make it 1-1.

Hereford got into the game more after that and Dale were looking poorer as the game went on.

Spencer wasn't looking too convincing when coming for crosses and I thought that Hereford would be ahead before long, luckily, the likes of Trevor Benjamin didn't have their shooting boots on despite the fact that Ainsworth was skinning us at will and setting them up.

Spencer did show that he does have quality though by turning over another Robinson effort brilliantly.

He did however nearly cost us another goal when he tried to punch an effort away when catching it was much easier and the rebound fell to Rose who shot ever so slightly wide.

Half time came and we imagined that Hill's team talk would have included a fair bit of shouting and hopefully they would come out and look like the Dale that finished last season.

It didn't work that way though and it was quite simply a case of more of the same.

Clint Easton made Simon Ramsden look poor as he'd done most of the afternoon before putting in a superb pass for the danger man Ainsworth to volley over the bar when he should have done much better.

Dale did improve just a little with Branston making up for a poor first half with an improved second half and Kennedy looked to be the pick of the Dale back line.  Perkins had worked hard in the middle and Doolan looked to create when he could but there was far too much hoofing of the ball to the forward line which their back line accepted with open arms.

Perkins received a harsh yellow card for being a tad petulant (lovely word) and charging out of the wall to a free kick.

Trevor Benjamin should have wrapped things up when he turned McArdle and shot goalwards but his shot was very well saved by Spencer who turned it out for a corner.

Finally some changes were made by Dale and the captain Gary Jones and Rory Prendergast went off for Lee Crooks and Adam Le Fondre.  Jones had been poor again and although the intentions were more than likely good by Keith Hill, it looked to a lot of fans, like the inclusion of Jones ahead of Muirhead meant that the captain was undroppable (is that a word?).

The changes didn't really have much effect.  Dale kept hoofing it to the forwards and although Le Fondre provided a fresh pair of legs and some energy, nothing came of it.

With about five minutes to go, the Rob Styles impersonator decided it would be funny to send off David Perkins and showed him an extremely harsh second yellow card for apparently obstructing Ainsworth who had quite clearly targeted Perkins and just ran into him.

This pretty much summed up what was another awful day for Dale and even as I'm writing this now, it doesn't feel like we've come away with a point.  I keep having to remind myself that we didn't actually lose the game!

No doubt now we'll perform superbly against Norwich!

Ratings:

Spencer - 6

Ramsden - 4

Kennedy - 6

Branston - 6

McArdle - 6

Jones - 5

Prendergast - 6

Doolan - 6

Perkins - 6

Dagnall - 6

Murray - 6

Crooks - 6

Le Fondre - 6

Rundle - 6

Photo: Action Images

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