Artificial league table providing perfect inspiration for red-hot Doncaster Rovers

Grant McCann's side have won eight consecutive matches, seven on the spin at home and have not so much ripped up the formbook but pulped it and wrote a brand new hardback. Not even top flight heavyweights such as Liverpool or Manchester City can compete with the winning run being strung together in this part of South Yorkshire.

This latest victory, a four-goal evisceration of Accrington Stanley, barely saw them get out of second gear. It's an ominous warning to the seven sides above Rovers. With three games left they sit just a place outside the play-offs and a solitary point shy of seventh-placed Crawley.

Whilst the regular league standings are making for fine reading for McCann's side right now, it is an alternative league table that is providing the real inspiration for this spirited run.

At the end of January following a last-gasp draw with struggling Sutton, the Northern Irishman decided that it was time for a reset and that from now on he would only consult his newly-devised table. It would chart Rovers' form for the final 18 games of the season.

Safe to say that they now sit healthily at the top of this ladder after a transformational few months.

"I think we're top by quite a few points to be honest," McCann said. "It's fantastic from the boys but we've got another three to go.

"It'll be interesting to see where we are when the analysts put it up on the wall Monday.

"It was tough because I know when you're in a position like we were before the Sutton game, people can focus a lot on the table as it was at the time.

"We knew there was 18 games left and a lot of points to play for so we never lost faith in terms of where we think we could be. I guess what's happened is we've re-focused the group and seen if we can finish top of this (18-game table). Because if we do finish top of this we give ourselves a real chance of having a strong finish. Even though the boys will probably be still on their phones looking at the real table, the only table important to me is this one."

Hakeeb Adelakun once again dazzled here for Rovers, scoring the opener before teeing up Joe Ironside for the second. The Lincoln City loanee was the star of the show and displayed his confidence when slotting home in the opening exchanges after a fine ball from Joseph Olowu picked him out.

He then turned provider for Ironside who finished from close range to become the first Rovers player since John Marquis in 2018-19 to bring up 20 goals in a season.

Full-back James Maxwell then scored a classy third in the second half, starting and finishing a sweeping team move, before ever-present Owen Bailey wrapped up proceedings.

It was about as comfortable an afternoon as McCann could have wished for. Maxwell, one of a clutch of players to have recently signed a new contract, toed the party line and says that all the focus is on finishing top of McCann's artificial table and giving themselves the best chance of gate-crashing the end-of-season lottery.

"It goes up every morning in the meetings and slideshows we have. We're the form team and so we want to finish top of it, and handsomely top of it. And then where that takes us in the actual table, we'll just have to see."

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