TOWN boss Mark Cooper admitted that preparing his players for how the opposition will play is a bit of potluck.

As has been noted with great regularity, the keep-ball style deployed by Cooper’s side forces almost every team to adapt their game to try and negate Town’s high percentage football. It often renders teams unrecognisable from the one their own fans see every other week.

Keith Hill’s Rochdale are perhaps the best example of a side who have visited the County Ground and abandoned their usual approach specifically to deal with Swindon, winning 3-2 back in October.

Cooper was surprised by Hills tactics that day and admits that the tendencies for his opposite number in the dugout to employ a new system leaves him guessing and having to plan for multiple eventualities.

“Until the game starts it’s difficult for us to know what teams are going to do because they tend to change quite a lot from the previous games,” said the Robins manager.

“We make the players fully aware if this happens then we need to do that, if this happens we need to do this, that's the way we try and do it.

“We try to prepare the players for every eventuality, so we've played against teams that have pressed, we have played against teams that have dropped off.

“We don’t have to change too much in terms of how we play because we know that we will try and wrestle the ball from the opposition and keep it off them.

“Depending on who might be playing we might have to try and switch the ball quicker or we might have to concentrate on one area.

“We will make the players fully aware of what we expect Doncaster to do and if they don't do that then we'll have to do something else.”

As for Doncaster Rovers, Cooper is expecting plenty of fight from a team aiming to mirror their manager, Paul Dickov, in his approach as a player "I got to watch them last week at home against Notts County (in the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy) and they were quite unlucky in that game,” added Cooper “We're aware of their away record and the one thing from watching them and seeing the footage is that they work extremely hard, which you'd expect with Paul Dickov being their manager.

"The two front players work incredibly hard in terms of closing down and making life difficult. So we know it's going to be a real tough game for us.

"They were a Championship club last year and they have retained quite a few of the players from that, so they have quality throughout their team. They have got experience in all areas of the pitch.

“Maybe away from home they sit a little bit deeper and invite teams on to them and counter attack. It's like every team if you're not at it, and they are, you can get beat.”