Grant McCann confident Doncaster Rovers will keep improving ahead of Stockport County trip

Grant McCann might have stopped short of using that cliché, but that was the point he sought to make after Doncaster’s latest win did little to clear the traffic between them and those sides currently in the League Two promotion mix.

Rovers head into tomorrow’s trip to high-flying Stockport County in twentieth position, eight points off seventh spot with almost a quarter of the season played.

They are paying the price for a slow start to the season despite an upturn in form.

"It’s early in the season,” stressed McCann.

"The table is going to change. There’s 35 games left, it’s going to keep chopping and changing as we go on into December and January.”

If Doncaster are to begin climbing the table, they might want to take inspiration from Bolton Wanderers when they won promotion from the fourth tier in the 2020/21 season.

Ian Evatt’s side were as low as nineteenth in February 2021 with 26 matches played, ten points off the play-offs.

A run of 15 wins in their final 20 matches saw them secure the final automatic promotion spot on the final day.

Midfielder Antoni Sarcevic scored for Bolton that afternoon and will likely line up against Rovers for Stockport tomorrow, having also scored in their midweek win over Forest Green.

Much fancied for another shot at promotion after finishing fourth last term and losing in the play-off final, the Hatters head into this weekend’s clash on a five-game winning run.

They too came on strong in the second half of the season after a slow start left them in the bottom half of the table on New Year’s Day, when Doncaster put in one of their best performances of the campaign to beat eventual play-off winners Carlisle United and move to within a point of the top seven.

"We are quite calm,” McCann said of his side’s current predicament.

"We want to be better, of course, but we are quite calm and we know we will start improving. Over a number of weeks now I think we have seen that.

"We stepped off it a little bit on Saturday (against Barrow) but returned to it again on Tuesday (against Crawley).”