Stephen Dobbie's impact as Blackpool's interim boss hailed by former teammate

Despite Blackpool’s relegation to League One being confirmed last week, they have been much improved since Dobbie took charge on a caretaker basis following Mick McCarthy’s departure last month.

The 40-year-old has overseen two wins from his five games in charge up to this point, but performances have also been much better in the games they lost.

Eardley, who has taken over responsibility for the development squad following Dobbie’s recent promotion, has nothing but good things to say about his former teammate.

“He’s been superb,” he told The Gazette.

“Although what’s happened has happened, I’m sure everybody would agree you can clearly see the first-team group were buying what Dobbs and Blinks (Matt Blinkhorn) were trying to do.

“They deserve huge credit in such a short space of time for having a real go. For the fans to see that and for the team to take it as far as they did, I think they’ve been magnificent and great for the football club.”

Despite Eardley taking charge of the development squad for their recent Central League Cup final win, the foundations were put in place by Dobbie earlier in the season.

When asked how much of the success was down to Dobbie, Eardley emphatically replied: “All of it!

“Since he got the job with the first-team, I took the semi-final game, Lee Camp has been in helping out and he’s been great for the group.

“I was asked to do the final and when I’m asked to do something I’ll do it to the best of my ability. We tried to prepare the lads the best we could for the game, we did a bit of homework on Wigan, but that wasn’t just me, it was a group effort.

“I always say it, the staff here are great. We all pull together and we’re all on the same page, so a huge amount of credit goes to Dobbs because he’s had them all season and he’s put some great work in with them.

“All of them have improved as players and that’s down to him. It’s a group effort with players and staff.”