Rochdale climbed to third in the league after a very easy 2-0 win over Mansfield Town with goals from Blair Sturrock and Grant Holt. A full match report along with player ratings is now online.

Rochdale returned to winning ways after the shambolic refereeing of last week at Boston with a 2-0 win over strugglers Mansfield Town.  The result, performance and continuous chants of "We want Palmer out" from the Stags were too much for Carlton and he resigned as manager after the match to the relief of many travelling Stags.

Steve Parkin threatened there would be changes to the defence with Dale conceding silly goals and not keeping a clean sheet so far and Jon Boardman was the sacrifice as he was dropped from the squad completely.  Ernie Cooksey was out as well having picked up an injury against Boston.  Paul Tait was available for selection but quite rightly left out of the squad with Clive Moyo-Modise getting on the bench instead.  Matt Gilks lined up in net with Jamie Clarke, Alan Goodall, Tony Gallimore and Gareth Griffiths in defence.  A three man midfield was in operation and consisted of Neil Brisco, Scott Warner and Gary Jones with Blair Sturrock, Rickie Lambert and Grant Holt playing up front.  Danny Woodhall, Rory McArdle, Tommy Jaszczun, Ben Kitchen and Clive Moyo Modise were on the bench.

Dale got off to a good start and looked dangerous early on.  With just four minutes gone, we had a header cleared off the line by Alex John the Baptiste.

Rochdale were awarded a freekick in Lambert territory with less than ten minutes gone and with it being Lambert, expectation was high and he proved he was in fact human and he hit it over the bar.

Grant Holt showed his physical prowess with just over ten minutes gone as he so often does as he managed to get round a defender and blast a shot at Pressman from a tight angle which the big keeper knew little about!  Rickie Lambert got in on the action just after with a shot that went narrowly wide of the post.

Holty had another good effort as he shot from distance but Pressman pushed it over the bar to deny the best striker the world has ever seen.

Rochdale made it 1-0 on twenty five minutes when Gary Jones managed to set up Blair Sturrock in the box and Sturrock struck the ball into the bottom right hand corner from a wide angle for his first ever Rochdale goal and he certainly enjoyed it. 

Mansfield weren't doing themselves any favours and really were looking clueless.  If Tim Lovejoy had been watching, he could have a whole seasons worth of Taxi from the Mansfield mistakes and this prompted Carlton Palmer into making a double substitution with just over half an hour gone.  The Mansfield fans were less than happy and a huge chorus of "We want Palmer out say we want Palmer out" was heard along with "You don't know what you're doing".

The half time whistle came and Dale went into the break with a one goal advantage though they hadn't really played as well as they had most of the season so far.

Mansfield came out for the second looking the better side and Dale took an age to get going again.  The double substitution of Mansfield's added numbers to the midfield and we struggled to get to grips with a three man midfield and there was calls for Parkin to bring a midfielder on.

Things were made worse for Palmer when his side were reduced to ten men.  Alan Goodall jumped with John Hjelde and the Dale left back received a clear elbow to the face leaving Gooders with a bloody nose.  The referee showed Hjelde the red card and he can have no arguments really.

The second half was very poor in all honesty and the first real goalmouth action came when a corner was headed goalwards by Grant Holt but his header was cleared off the line.

With seventy nine minutes gone, Rochdale made their substitution as Tommy Jaszczun replaced a disappointing Rickie Lambert.  The swap proved to be a cracking move as just four minutes later, Dale were awarded a freekick after some superb battling and chasing down from Blair Sturrock won him a freekick as he was held back.  Tommy J put a quick freekick into the box and before Mansfield realised where they were, Grant Holt was diving on the end of it and headed past Kevin Pressman to make it 2-0 to Dale.  This was Holt's eighth goal in nine league games which is some return if you ask me!

Dale had thus far done something they haven't done all season and not conceded a goal during the match but that shouldn't have been the case in stoppage time as a glaring miss from Richie Barker who headed over in front of an open net.  That miss set me off laughing but in truth the whole Mansfield performance was laughable and their fans will now be very relieved that Carlton Palmer has resigned as manager.

It was a welcome three points for Dale who now sit in third place behind Carlisle and Grimsby Town.  Next up for Rochdale is a long trip down to Barnet next week.

Player Ratings:

Matt Gilks 6 Kicking was a little off at times but in truth had bugger all else to do

Jamie Clarke 6 Passing was ok but his defending was a little suspect and he did make a few mistakes

Alan Goodall 7 Got forward as usual and put some superb tackles in, decent game for Gooders

TONY GALLIMORE 8 Man of the match by some distance I thought.  Didn't put a foot wrong and was class.  Read the game brilliantly and looked immense at the back with Griffiths

Gareth Griffiths 7 We looked a lot better at the back with him and Galli there, excellent in the air and was solid as a rock

Scott Warner 7 Got stuck in well in what was a typical Warner performance

Neil Brisco 6 Didn't do badly but never excelled either.  Passing looked good at times

Gary Jones 7 Worked hard and got into the game more after a slow start

Blair Sturrock 7 Best performance for the club and also grabbed his first goal.  Ran his nuts off all game and proved to be a big handful.  Probably our best attacker today

Rickie Lambert 6 Quiet game for Rickie, was involved in a couple of moves but not much else and was subbed in the second half

Grant Holt 7 Decent performance from Holt but he did look a little off at times.  Very well taken goal though to put the game beyond doubt

Sub:  

Tommy Jaszczun Set up the second goal with some excellent quick thinking and did well after coming on for Lambert

Clive Moyo Modise Came on with not too long left for an impressive Sturrock and looked lively

Rory McArdle 7 Came on for Griff very late on and I don't think he had time for a kick

Photo: Action Images

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