Note the date. Tuesday 2nd March 2010. History was made at Spotland.

Now we may all take the Keith Hill line of being "confident without being arrogant", and of course as Dale supporters, we'll always retain that "until its mathematically certain" thinking, but when it comes to the end of the season, then surely this will be the evening where we look back upon and pinpoint as being the one, the difference, the night where thirty odd years of disappointment came to an end.

For in the twenty nine years that I've spent watching Dale, it's very difficult to think of a game that we can compare with this one. A game where we've gone head to head with one of our closest rivals in the league table, and come away as such worthy winners. Actually, that doesn't do it justice. This was a proper footballing lesson, and one which could have long term implications for Rotherham's chances of success this season.

It's really difficult to write this report, and not get carried away. This was a hammering of such an extent that we practically had an evacuation from the away end with over fifteen minutes to go, where fans left in genuine fear of what the final score could have ended up being. They knew what they'd witnessed. This was soul destroying, and it could have been much worse for them.

We went into the game with some enforced changes. The loan deal of Jason Taylor didn't allow him to play against a side he's clearly not good enough to play for and another former Miller Scott Wiseman was ruled out through the knock that he picked up at Macclesfield at the weekend.

Of course, aside from the nature of the contest which saw Dale take on a genuine promotion rival, knowing that this would go along way to deciding the destiny of both sides for this season, it also brought the return of Adam Le Fondre, which could not be ignored by anyone.

Alfie's departure brought a bit of needle between the supporters earlier in the season, and it was inevitable that it would cast something of a shadow over the game. Not sure why Alfie got stick off what was most certainly a minority of Dale supporters, when we've seen every other former Dale player get warmly applauded this season, but at least it was a long way short of the abuse that Chris O'Grady received off the disappointing number of Rotherham supporters. He who laughs last.

I actually missed the start of the game, due to a parents evening. Committed parent that I am and all that, and I'm sure all these levels and red, green and yellow stuff is dead important but will you hurry up please Miss, because we could go eight points clear tonight.

But let it be said, I got there just in the nick of time. From what I could ascertain, it had clearly started off as a high tempo game, but whether we cleared it off the line seven times or had a couple of goals disallowed, I couldn't tell you. You'll have to settle for more professional match reports for that sort of stuff.

However, I was there to witness Chris O'Grady whistle his way down the wing, before crossing the ball to Chris Dagnall. Just like I was there to see that on Saturday where Dagnall fluffed his lines from a yard out with the goal at his mercy. But this time there was to be no repeat performance, and his shot on the turn gave Warrington no chance as Dale took the lead.

That lead could have been doubled not long after when a Craig Dawson header troubled Warrington. It looked very close to creeping underneath him but the former Bury man did what was required to keep the ball and to keep the Millers in the game.

It from this moment that Rotherham had their best spell of the game, and they'll no doubt think themselves unlucky not to have scored at this stage of the game.

Like ourselves, they were playing at a high tempo, and retaining the majority of the possession. Aside from the obvious threat of Le Fondre, they fed some very awkward balls into our box, and despite there being three central defenders in the Dale side, our visitors seemed to be winning everything in the air.

This dominance led to a few long range efforts which certainly troubled Fielding. In close succession, Fielding kept out about three or four really good efforts that were fired at him with pace, and in some quarters, our England U-21 keeper got a bit of stick for not actually catching the ball, but it was a case of modern goalkeeping at its best, as his punched saves saw danger averted each time. We've suffered too many times in the past where attempted catches have seen nippy opposition strikers finish off the rebound.

But we weren't just content to soak up this pressure. We were battling hard ourselves, and a Tom Kennedy free kick almost beat his former Bury team mate when a thundering effort required tipping over. It was hearts in the mouth stuff for both sets of supporters throughout.

And then the unthinkable happened. Not a goal conceded, but a Craig Dawson yellow card. Our ever present central defender who is clearly destined for better things had only been despatched to look after Alfie for the first time of the game, and he brought him down in front of the dugouts for the first caution of his professional career. Correct decision without doubt.

Whilst the fans might not have been wanting the half to come to a close, the players most certainly would have been, if only for a breather. Proper cliché time, but this was definitely million miles an hour stuff, and you could see this was a game worthy of its pre-match hype.

But it was nowt but a breather, as the second half showed no signs of changing the tempo as both teams went for it as if the season came down to just one game.

Rotherham had a brilliant chance to equaliser, when a long range effort - not dissimilar to Gary Jones' recent effort against Dagenham - had Fielding scrambling to tip it wide. It was one of those chances which seemed to happen in slow motion, and looked for all the world like a goal as Spotland took a collective breath.

But this seemed to be a turning point, and whether it was a case of Dale now stepping up a gear, or Rotherham running out of steam as they did in their televised game against Shrewsbury recently, but Dale ran the show from now on from start to finish. Well from about 55th minute to finish.

A second goal had been threatened for some time as we started to exert our superiority over Rotherham, but when it eventually came, it was enough to see Macclesfield boss Keith Alexander claiming further proof that Dale are being funded by Satan's bag of footballing fortune. And who are we to argue?

Chris O'Grady has this wonderful talent that when he gets in the left hand side of a penalty box, he is unplayable, and he goes past players like they just aren't there. Not in a way where he's threatening to fall to the floor claiming for a spot kick, but he just seems to be even better in that area of the pitch than anywhere else.

And so arguably, O'Grady's brilliant work was worthy of a bit of luck as he battled his way through the defence before putting over a very dangerous ball to the centre of the six yard box. It was successfully cleared. Successfully until it hit sub Green before bouncing back five or six yards back into his own goal to double our lead. Just one of those things I'm afraid, with no real blame to be attributed to either player, but we'll let Rotherham deal with the post mortems from it all.

From now on, we were on fire, producing what can only be described as a Champions performance. We were untouchable, and threatened to tear Rotherham to shreds every time we got the ball.

2-0 became 3-0 soon after, with the goal coming from Craig Dawson. Dawson has been suffering from what he must consider to be something of a goal drought in recent weeks. Six games without a goal? What sort of goalscoring central defender do you think you are?

But in his first game at Spotland since signing his contract extension, he produced a fantastic header from a Tom Kennedy corner to make it 3-0. The goal showed progress for the lad, as most of his goals from corners have involved breaking free of his defenders and forcing the ball home. This was a beauty as he leapt like the proverbial salmon producing a looping header from around the penalty spot. It settled almost artistically in the top corner. Rochdale fan, Rochdale player, Rochdale goalscorer.

Subs were made by the visitors but it was nothing but a token gesture as they tried to get something out of the game. But they couldn't get something out of the game when they couldn't even get the ball off us. It was a masterclass of passing football that left Rotherham chasing shadows.

It was fitting however, that the game's best player - Chris O'Grady - should get the fourth and final goal. The player, booed throughout for the misdemeanour of wanting his wages in days gone by, and cited as a greedy bastard over and over again. Primarily by the Rotherham supporters, and then by the Dale fans basking in the glory of something truly special.

And in his own small way, Chris O'Grady's performance tonight might not have seen a Tom Kennedy style reaction to his goal, but he knew full well that his goal and his display would have made the pain just that little bit worse for fans of the Millers. They knew a point had been made this evening.

That goal was sheer class, and in my book it will go down as one of the goals of the season. It was typical O'Grady. He made space for himself and with two covering defenders, he shimmied in such a way to manoeuvre them over to create just the space he needed to almost stroke the ball into the far corner.

One can only assume that fire alarms were going off in the away end, as over half of the sub 700 away following got up en masse and headed straight for the exits. I don't recall a scene of so many supporters upping and leaving in one go before - especially not with over fifteen minutes of the game to go. I do hope that they caught O'Grady's eye on the way out.

However, those departed Millers will be pleased to know that they didn't miss out on any further goals. There were plenty of chances, and Warrington had to be on fine form on a couple of occasions to keep it down to just four goals. Even Rotherham had a couple of chances late on, and you got the feeling that the clean sheet was just as important to the management as the four goals were.

But on the whole, the game was played out at a canter, as the Dale players rolled the ball around the pitch, lapping up the olés from the stands - much to the annoyance of Dave Flitcroft at one point, as we looked to just enjoy ourselves, enjoying the occasion.

So three more points take us to 68 points with thirteen games still to go. We could outline all the potential records that we stand to beat this season, but put simply, any "best" record that we might have had in the past is in danger of getting consigned to the history books throughout the next few weeks.

Whilst nothing has been achieved as of yet, we stand on the verge of greatness. Tonight has gone a long way towards achieving that.