Former Everton and Ipswich Town man opens up on Blackpool's struggles this season

The Seasiders head into this weekend’s crucial encounter against Rotherham United in 23rd place in the division, three points adrift of safety.

It’s been tough going for the most part, with Blackpool without a win in their last 12 league games.

“I think there’s a lot of reasons behind it,” Connolly said.

“Me personally, I wouldn’t say it’s too much of a different squad to last season although we have brought some new players in...

“But I think the standard is better this year. Last season it wasn’t as good as the Championship has been over the last few years.

“We’ve been unfortunate in a lot of games but at the same time we haven’t been good enough. That’s me being honest, we haven’t been good enough in a lot of games.

“But we’ve got 17 games left, so everyone is confident we can still put it right. There’s still that belief.

“The players come in every day and there’s still a lot of happy faces. I know we’re in the bottom three at the minute but that can easily change in this league.

“If we get three points on Saturday it will be a boost for us. We’ve got some difficult games coming up so we’ve got a big few weeks coming up, but we just need to take every game step-by-step, so we’re fully focused on Rotherham now.”