Fleetwood boss happy to finish fourth and battle the Bantams

David Ball is denied by Vale keeper Leo Fasan

The final day of the regular season ended with a goalless Highbury draw with Port Vale, whose players sank to their knees as the point wasn’t enough to stave off relegation.

Town themselves had just beaten the drop on the final day of last season, since when Rosler has turned the club around. And the head coach says there is more to look forward to.

Rosler said after yesterday’s draw: “We have to separate the two things – this game and the whole season.

“After 46 games we have 82 points, 31 more than last year. That is a real achievement for the players and staff, and I thank them. Now we have something to look forward to.

“I made a substitution with Conor McLaughlin on yellow, so I was already thinking about Thursday (the day of the first leg at Valley Parade) throughout the game.”

Rosler wasn’t too disappointed to slip below Scunthorpe and so avoid a Thursday date at Millwall.

He added: “I heard we were fourth and I wanted to keep it. We went out to win the game – you could see (that from) our substitutions. We had Devante Cole and Cameron Brannagan on at the end, and Bobby Grant and David Ball playing as strikers. It was like a basketball game at the end.

“We tried everything but I wasn’t too angry or disappointed when I heard we had finished fourth.

“I wanted the second game at home (next Sunday) and I didn’t really want to travel down to London.

“If Bolton had lost and we hadn’t done our own work it would have been a big disappointment, but it was never in our hands.

“Everything pointed in the direction of Bolton. They had their main player back – Gary Madine. They are a different outfit with him in and I didn’t expect any different outcome (Wanderers beat Peterborough 3-0).”

Cian Bolger hobbled off in the 16th minute but Rosler stressed it was too early to say whether the key defender would feature in the play-offs.

The Town boss said: “Immediately he showed he had to go off and those are not good signs. I’m a little bit flat because of the Bolger situation but that is football.”