Grant McCann urges Doncaster to ‘be better, calmer and braver’

Manager Grant McCann urged Doncaster to “be better, calmer and braver” after they moved up to second in League Two following a 2-1 win away to Accrington.

Rovers had the dream start after two minutes when Jordan Gibson’s cross was fired home by Harry Clifton.

Stanley came out more on the front foot after the break and equalised after 57 minutes when a Ben Woods corner was volleyed home by Stanley captain Seamus Conneely.

However – just after the hour – Doncaster were back in front when Clifton’s ball into the six-yard box was turned into his own net by defender Benn Ward, while Rovers substitute Patrick Kelly was sent off for a dangerous challenge on Ben Woods at the death.

McCann said: “I thought we started strongly, we scored a very good goal and we had a couple of opportunities where we should have taken the game away from them.

“At half-time, I felt we needed that second goal and then it was a disappointing goal from our point of view to concede.

“But the beauty of our team is that the response was excellent. To score so quickly was pleasing, even though we got a slice of luck.

“That’s two away wins this week after the disappointment of Grimsby but we need to better, calmer, have more control and be braver at times to get on the ball and make things happen and we will continue to work on that.

“At this stage though it’s all about winning games.

“For us this week that’s two good goals and an own goal and we have won two games, it’s six points and that’s all we can do.”

Stanley have not won in six games and remain in 21st place, just four points from the bottom two.

Boss John Doolan said: “We can’t start games like that. We were poor for the first half-an-hour or so. I think it’s as bad as we have been since I have been here. We started so slowly and conceded after two minutes.

“We wanted a response but we looked nervous. No one was taking responsibility so we changed the shape after 30 minutes.

“We got a foothold back in the game and started the second half livelier. We started with higher tempo, we went at them and put them on the back foot.

“We had worked on set-pieces and Seamus scored an unbelievable goal and I thought there was only one team in it then.

“Then to concede an own goal four minutes after equalising, it’s poor on our side even though it was unlucky.

“We have 15 games now. I have let the players know the first half wasn’t acceptable and the second half was reasonable against a team pushing for automatic promotion.”