Blackpool stunned as Neil Critchley departs for Aston Villa

The Seasiders came up to the second tier via the League One play-offs last year, having seen Hull City and Peterborough United automatically promoted.

Of the three, it was Critchley’s players who looked the most at home in the Championship this season, finishing 16th and 23 points clear of the bottom three.

Hull, meanwhile, ended the campaign in 19th and were nine points worse off than the Seasiders.

Despite thrashing Blackpool on the final day, Posh were the worst performing side, finishing inside the relegation zone ahead of another season in League One.

“It just shows you the progression and where we are,” Critchley told The Gazette.

“We came up through the play-offs, Hull won the league and Peterborough finished second, but we finished really strongly in the second half of last season.

“When you get promoted, you’re always aiming to be the best out of the promoted teams: can you finish above them because that means you’re automatically going to finish above two teams?

“That was one of our aims, to be the best promoted team and we’ve done that. Over the course of the season we’ve been looking up.

“For various reasons it’s not gone Peterborough’s way, but they’ve still got some very good players as we know from last season.

“Grant (McCann, manager) and Cliff (Byrne, assistant) have gone back into Peterborough. They’ve been there before and their results have picked up recently.

“I’m sure they will know what they’ll need or what they need to do to bounce back next season in League One.”

Blackpool midfielder Kenny Dougall earned another international cap after featuring in Australia’s midweek friendly win against Jordan.

The 29-year-old played the first 45 minutes of the Socceroos’ 2-1 victory, serving as a warm-up to their World Cup play-off next week.

They meet the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday with the winners then facing Peru to determine who qualifies for the tournament later this year.

Whoever progresses of Australia, the UAE or Peru will go into Group D to face reigning champions France, Denmark and Tunisia.