Burton’s improvement under Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink continued with a 2-0 win at struggling Rochdale

The home side started brightly at the Crown Oil Arena, where they had won just once in their 19 previous games, and almost caught the visitors cold in the opening attack. Stephen Humphrys, Kwadwo Baah and Alex Newby all saw efforts blocked by a desperate Brewers defence.

Newby later saw a tame header saved by Ben Garratt in the visitors goal but Burton gradually grew into the game and forced Gavin Bazunu into stops to deny Jonny Smith and Sean Clare.

The Brewers’ best effort of the half came five minutes before the break, when Tom Hamer’s volley was brilliantly saved by Bazunu.

Burton turned up the pressure on Dale after the interval, substitute Kane Hemmings firing a chance over the crossbar before opening the scoring when he poked home in the 66th minute after Michael Bostwick had flicked on Hamer’s long throw-in.

Dale’s hopes of salvaging something from the game were dealt a hefty blow in the 77th minute when Ollie Rathbone was dismissed following an altercation with Smith.

And Lucas Akins wrapped up the win with Burton’s second goal in the 86th minute with a fine curling effort from 20 yards.