'Crack on': Rotherham United captain's defiant League One message after win at Northampton Town - and Bradford City claim

Matt Hamshaw’s side remain in the bottom four of League One despite Saturday’s relieving 2-1 victory at Northampton Town.

For his part, Rafferty, who chose the perfect time to break his goal-scoring duck for the campaign with a priceless leveller at Sixfields, is quick to stress that this season is anything but a pure survival fight, with three-quarters of the campaign still to go.

Equally, he feels that the catalyst that club needed came to fruition against the Cobblers, thanks to Josh Benson’s glorious 87th-minute free-kick winner as the Millers won for the first time on the road since April 8.

Psychologically, after some previous painful late blows against the likes of Bradford City, Wigan Athletic and Mansfield Town, it felt particularly consequential.

Rafferty said: "We've had a few (blows), but we took a lot of confidence (drawing) against Bradford. I (still) think we should be beating Bradford at home and away. I think we should be beating every team in this league, to be totally honest.

"We have had our confidence probably knocked a little bit. But I think we're still a confident group. We still believe in each other.

"So there's no reason why we can't go and crack on.

"We've obviously got players coming back. We've had quite bad injuries at times.

"But, you know, maybe we're all ‘mental’ in there because we were sat after 10 games in 23th in the table and we still believe that we can go on and do something with the season.

"I think that shows something (about) where we are as a group. We still believe that we can go on, win the next game and hopefully go on a really good run from now."

While delighted with his own goalscoring contribution, Rafferty admitted to being particularly delighted for match-winner Benson, who is starting to show the quality that was stymied in two injury-hit campaigns at previous club Barnsley.

That manager Matt Hamshaw was also afforded a Saturday to savour after doing it tough during a difficult period with his hometown club - which means that every tough result and moment stings that little bit more - was also something that Rafferty was elated about.

He continued: "We're absolutely buzzing for him (Hamshaw). We give everything we've got for him and the staff because they're all incredible.

"They put hours of work into doing the job. So as players, we all love them and we're all right behind them."

As for Benson’s late intervention, he said: "We know Benno's got that. We see it in training.

"We've been giving him a little bit of a stick because I think he'd taken about four and not scored.

"The lads on the bench came in and said every single one of them fancied him on the free kick.

"He's a really good player and we know he's got that in his locker. When he got it in that area, we knew there was a good chance."