Football: Rochdale 1 - 0 Hull City

Joe Rafferty scored the only goal of the game

Rochdale continued their winning start to pre-season with Joe Rafferty’s late goal proving enough to earn a win against Championship outfit Hull City at the Crown Oil Arena.

The Dale full back struck left footed shot from the corner of the area beyond the despairing dive of David Marshall in the Tigers goal as Rochdale made it three wins from three.

After wins against Stalybridge Celtic (3-0) and Stockport County (1-0) either side of the warm weather training camp in Tenerife, Rochdale returned to home soil for the first of two pre-season friendlies at the Crown Oil Arena (the other is against Middlesborough, Tuesday 24 July, kick off at 7:30pm).

Coming up against a Hull City side fresh from a tour of The Algarve in Portugal, Dale manager Keith Hill named a fairly strong side which included new signings MJ Williams, David Perkins, Bradden Inman and Aaron Wilbraham.

The first half was a lively affair although goal mouth action was a ta premium with neither goalkeeper seriously called into action although David Marshall was the slightly busier of the two number ones.

Some intricate football on the edge of the Hull area saw Perkins slipped through; Marshall was on hand to block with his legs.

Lillis had a quite afternoon as Nigel Adkins side needed to tweak the radar slightly when shooting at the Dale goal. Brazilian Evandro should have done better when the visitors hit Rochdale on the counter attack; his shot dragging across the face of goal.

Wilbraham warmed the hands of Marshall with a powerful shot shortly before the break and in their panic to clear, the Hull backline got into a mess with Marshall picking up a back pass resulting in an indirect free-kick on the corner of the six yard box. Wilbraham seeing his low shot deflected wide for a corner ball.

The second half was played at a much slower tempo with both sides firing over on numerous occasions.

The visitors changed their entire outfield players in the 75th minute whilst Hill introduced Calvin Andrew, Joe Thompson and Dan Adshead during the second half.

The only goal of the game came in the last minute; Rafferty firstly nutmegged the left back before curling a neat shot inside the far post to earn a moral boosting victory.