It is with great relief I can tell you that the 2011/2012 relegation campaign is over and we can move onto some actually relatively successful Dale signings, starting with right-back Joe Rafferty.

Position: Right-back

Appearances: 214

Goals: 3

Arrived from: Liverpool

Left for: Preston North End

If one real positive came from John Coleman's spell in charge of the club, the 2012 signing of Joe Rafferty from Liverpool can lay a serious claim to being that positive.

Having been born in Liverpool, Rafferty joined the Reds, the club he supported as a boy, aged 10 in 2003 and ended up captaining the U18 team. At one stage, he looked set for potential first-team involvement having played for the Republic of Ireland at both U18 and U19 stages.

However, in 2012 he found himself without a club and so joined Rochdale alongside two other players who could play right-back in the shape of Matty Pearson and Rhys Bennett.

Unsurprisingly with such competition, first-team minutes were hard to come by at first for Raffer, but eventually he would start to displace the other two, with Bennett playing centrally more often and Rafferty more reliable than Pearson with both players still at such a young age. From mid-September onwards he appeared to be first choice for Coleman, but dropped out of the team in the final few weeks of his reign.

Upon Hill's appointment however, Rafferty was restored to the starting eleven and although he missed out on some fixtures in February and March, he finished his first season in men's football with 21 appearances and had held his own for the majority of those, despite clearly having plenty to learn at this stage.

In 2013/2014, as with many players in the Rochdale squad, Rafferty really came of age. As Hill's team settled into a steady rhythm, the right-back spot was dominated by Raffer and he started 31 times as Dale won promotion into League One.

Seen as a steady player who prioritised defending first, he still wasn't afraid of bursting forward at pace to join the attack and even breaking into the box on the odd occasion. Strong in the tackle and a good reader of the game, Rafferty started to become a fan's favourite during his time with the club.

Not only were his performances on the pitch impressive, he also seemed to be a very affable member of the squad and always seemed to have time for a laugh and to connect with supporters.

He dealt well with the step-up to League One and again made 31 appearances in that season as Dale looked to push for the play-offs, scoring his first EFL goal with a brilliant strike in a 2-1 defeat at Peterborough. He made another 31 appearances the following season as Dale once again pushed hard in the top half of the second tier, again finding the net on one occasion with a fine left-footed finish as Dale came from behind to thump Southend 4-1.

In these early seasons, it did seem that whenever Rafferty found himself out of the team, form tended to dip whereas it would improve upon his reintroduction, which is perhaps testament to the hunger he had to improve in these early years as a young player. The obvious deficiencies that had been there during the early stages of his time at the club were becoming less and less obvious season on season.

With Rhys Bennett no longer part of the squad, Rafferty became a near ever-present in 2016/2017, playing no fewer than 40 games as Dale finished in 9th place. By this point, Rafferty's confidence in his own technical ability was improving and he was becoming more of a threat going forward, providing crosses from deep and making overlapping runs beyond the midfield to join in the attack.

In 2017/2018 he featured in six FA Cup games as Dale reached the Fifth Round and played at Wembley versus Tottenham Hotspur and he was also on the pitch for the famous victory over Charlton Athletic on the final day of the season, celebrating with the fans long after the final whistle had gone in the match at Sixfields, securing Dale's safety and sending Oldham into the fourth tier.

He'll have been mightily relieved by that too, as just a few weeks earlier he had missed a crucial penalty in a 0-0 stalemate between the two Lancashire rivals that could have put the team in a much more comfortable position in the relegation battle in the final throes of that campaign. He did net his third and final league goal for the club earlier in the season though, heading home after a mistake from Tomas Holy in a 3-0 win over Gillingham at Spotland.

That would be Rafferty's final full season at Dale. He continued to be a near ever-present in the first half of the 2018/2019 campaign, but with the club looking to sell some of their talented young players before their contracts ran out, Rafferty found himself joining Andy Cannon and Harrison McGahey out of the exit door in the January transfer window.

Preston North End was Rafferty's destination and he left Dale having racked up a mightily impressive 214 league appearances in a Dale shirt. However, the Liverpudlian struggled at first to displace Darnell Fisher at Deepdale, making just six appearances in his first six months with his new club.

In the following two seasons he became a more regular starter, playing 51 times over 2019/20 and 2020/21, displaying his two-footedness through mostly featuring as a left-back during that time. He found the net once for the Lilywhites, opening the scoring in a 3-2 defeat at Swansea City.

2021/22 was a struggle for Rafferty and it came as no surprise when he was released after adding just five appearances to his total for PNE, which stood at 63 by the time he left. He has since joined Portsmouth and at the time of writing has made seven appearances for the League One side.

Although he won't be remembered as one of the most technically gifted players to ever play for Dale, Raf will always be remembered fondly by the Spotland faithful. A hard-working player who was constantly looking to improve and always had time for the supporters, he was a real success story of Hill's second period of the club and as a member of both a promotion-winning team and that 2017/2018 great escape along with it's FA Cup exploits, there will be plenty of reasons to remember his contribution for a long time to come.

Photo: Action Images

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