Saturday 4th February

[codaplenty]

Plenty of horse trading at the beginning of the week. 2 Good strikers in, Jayden Stockley and Jack Marriott, plus Ndaba to bolster the back line. More than sorry to see Paddy Lane depart, it was obvious he didn't hit it off with Scott Brown but great signing for Pompey GED Garner off to Barrow be who paid a club record fee for him.Wish both of our academy lads every success at their new clubs
Down to the nitty gritty with Burton at home and 6 pointer at stake. Our crap home form will give the visitors hope but failure to pick up 3 points would be more than bad news. Going for a 2-0 win for the Cods

 

[Bartonyellow]

Lots of new faces at our place. Whether they make any difference god only knows.
We need a point at least - will we get one?
No. 2-1 defeat for me.

 

[BarrieOwl]

2nd v 1st at ours. A cracking 3.7k up from Devon and around 300 home tickets left from whatever safety capacity we now have.

Should be a decent game though I'm a bit worried Plymouth have brought their own ref for it.

 

[thewwfc]

Seems like bloody ages since we’ve had a game, hopefully all these ne’er-do-wells can stop pissing about with their cup exploits and let us play league games now, we’d never be rude enough to do something like doing well in a cup, and mess other team’s schedules up.

Anyway.

Vale away, great bread and butter fixture for us, a team pretty close to us in the table so it’s a good barometer if we can get a result.

Matty Taylor’s second game vs us on the bounce, except last time it was for the three-sided ones.

For us I guess the big question is, are we still capable of actually scoring now Mehmeti has gone…the weight of expectation will be on the shoulders of new loan kid Chem Campbell, whether those expectations are fair or not.

Anyway, I’m really looking forward to this game (on iFollow as I’m a lazy git)…which is generally a surefire sign that we’re going to get tonked, but time will tell.

 

[valefan16]

A first Saturday home game in 2 and a half months (Nov 19th) so a bit of a novelty and a period now of 4 home games in 2 weeks and hopefully chance to claw some of those 14 points we need for safety which is the first aim.

Wycombe first, tricky tie led by a Vale hero (who is actually doing a Gareth Ainsworth night at Vale Park tomorrow evening!).

We played fairly well at their place, probably should of won but blew a hatful of chances (no change there) and got done by two of our standard long rangers we concede in a 2-2.

We’ve had a lot of injuries and no strikers for weeks now so hopefully Matty Taylor is ready to go and maybe Mipo but probably too soon for Ellis Harrison or James Wilson (but you never know).

Proctor is back after coming on the last 10 last week for his first minutes since August so hopefully get 30 minutes into him as well.

Wycombe, always tricky, terrible pitch (not ideal playing 2 sets of games on it in 3 days which won’t do us much good) hopefully get three points here but they are no mugs and a point as long as we get all three Tuesday wouldn’t be the end of the world.

 

[denzel ecfc]

Positive vibes going into our game with Charlton. Another full house will be keen to welcome our new signings and applaud those who are staying. And no Stockley to bang one in for them.

 

[kieran_vale]

Be great to welcome the great man back to VP. Just an absolute legend and a joy to watch as a player.

Be a good challenge for us, the game at their place was a really hard fought encounter so would imagine this will follow a similar pattern. My guess is at least one of Wilson or Harrison will be in the squad. There’s a reason DC said two weeks for both of them and usually means they are closer than he’s letting on.

 

[Si Robin]

Roll into Bolton, take our spanking, then move onto the important game against Accrington next weekend.

 

[Boletus Edulis]

First v second. Both sides think they have strengthened since we met earlier in the season. Four of us going up and back in a day, we must be mad. Long old poke. Very much looking forward to it. Green Army.

 

[K-Win]

Tough game at home to Barnsley. Expecting new recruits Paddy Lane and Di'Shon Bernard to start, probably at the expense of Jacobs and Raggett. I'd be happy with a draw as we've not fared well against the better teams generally.

Mousinho had his first defeat last week at Peterborough. We were second best for the majority of the game but finished strongly, which isn't something we've seen for a while. I think it shows that the players actually think they can create and score chances. That's something we really couldn't do in the last few months of the Cowley regime.

 

[Luke Imp]

Away at Accrington for us, the second weekend in a row where goal-shy sides meet. They're a bit of a bogey team for us, they just seem to shithouse a point or three every bloody time.

Interesting to see whether Kennedy throws the two new lads straight in. I can imagine he will with Plange given a) our lack of goals and b) lack of striker options full stop. It'll be a baptism of fire for Erhahon to come into the midfield at their place.

Accrington are five points behind us with a game in hand, and we're in a run of games where we need points on the board, especially after two 0-0's against MK and Cambridge, with Burton being called off. Problem with us is that we're drawing our home games, so draws away from home aren't really having the impact they normally would do.

An open terracing at the beginning of February for those who travel - what could possibly go wrong?!

 

[Chris FGR]

It’s a clash of the Ferguson’s, Posh are in decent form but if we want to give ourselves a chance we need to start winning games, starting tomorrow.

 

[Bobbin']

Positive vibes going into our game with Charlton. Another full house will be keen to welcome our new signings and applaud those who are staying. And no Stockley to bang one in for them.

Looking forward to this one, we’ve sold 1,100 ourselves so atmosphere should be a good one.

 

[The Jovial Forester]

Good test, if our Ferguson can get a win against Posh we can start hoping, otherwise it confirms what we pretty much know.

 

[Floreat Salopia]

Oxford United away.

Oxford come into this on the back of three straight defeats whereas we come into full of confidence and momentum from four wins on the bounce.

Oxford played Barnsley on Wednesday night so hopefully some of their players will be feeling it a bit come second half to give us a slight advantage. From reading the Oxford forum, the fans seem restless and if we can get an early goal tomorrow, it could turn toxic very quickly. Good chance to keep in touch of the top 6.

Oxford United 1-1 Salop (Leahy)

 

[Royalowl]

2nd v 1st at ours. A cracking 3.7k up from Devon and around 300 home tickets left from whatever safety capacity we now have.

Should be a decent game though I'm a bit worried Plymouth have brought their own ref for it.

Yep all the makings of a great game - capacity crowd of around 33-34k.

 

[Laker]

So apparently Ipswich are staying in Cambridge tonight ahead of our game tomorrow. Obviously with the early 3pm kick off, they needed to avoid the excessive one hour journey from theirs to ours tomorrow.

 

[BarrieOwl]

Yep all the makings of a great game - capacity crowd of around 33-34k.

Bet its just over 30k due to SAG

 

[Laker]

Bet its just over 30k due to SAG

Whenever Hillsborough has been included in World Cup or Euro bids, have they reduced the capacity then? Sounds like they’re only doing it for Wednesday games.

 

[Royalowl]

Bet its just over 30k due to SAG

Sheffield Star reporting around 33k.

 

[BarrieOwl]

Sheffield Star reporting around 33k.

So 30k then

 

[denzel ecfc]

Jevani Brown is out due to a disciplinary. Oh great.

 

[Moomin]

No Jevani Brown for us tomorrow as he’s being left out due to a ‘disciplinary matter’. Speculation going around that he was arrested earlier this week after an alleged assault.

Hopefully it’s all being blown out of proportion but if it’s as bad as it sounds then he’s fucked himself and us.

 

[Essex2Wessex]

Big Dunc will surely get a very warm welcome from home fans, just as he did from away fans (and a few toffee ringers) last week. (Our drum got broken from overuse, a fix has apparently been procured). Not many tickets left in the main stand, and you can bet the other stands (home and away) won't be far from capacity either. So should be as about as atmospheric an occasion as the New Lawn sees...

As for on the pitch.....Posh are clearly good, but not quite THAT good, not Wednesday at least, and we clearly not, but clearly not quite that bad, maybe. Still a question of how what is effectively a new team for us is to gel together quickly.


I'd be really happy under the circumstances with a draw, but maybe the change of tone in the dressing room (and fewer managerial hands in pockets) will have shaken things up a bit. I'd not bet on it though. But we'll see....

 

[BRFC_Gas]

No Jevani Brown for us tomorrow as he’s being left out due to a ‘disciplinary matter’. Speculation going around that he was arrested earlier this week after an alleged assault.

Hopefully it’s all being blown out of proportion but if it’s as bad as it sounds then he’s fucked himself and us.

Bit of a extreme way of getting out of his contract!

 

[leedsvaliant]

Looking forward to hopefully having a proper striker on the pitch. 1 point out of 9 but a run of games now where we have a chance of some points. Unfortunately, we're not likely to go up or down this season, so I feel a little bit deflated that there's nothing to play for but maybe a season of consolidation is what we need.

Wycombe were pretty poor when we played them earlier in the season and we really should have won . Will be interesting to see how they get on without Mehmeti, who I think was easily their best player. They've still got a strong squad though and I imagine it will be a real physical battle. A draw would be OK but I'd like us to win a few of our home games.

 

[Andy Proctor]

Looking forward to hopefully having a proper striker on the pitch. 1 point out of 9 but a run of games now where we have a chance of some points. Unfortunately, we're not likely to go up or down this season, so I feel a little bit deflated that there's nothing to play for but maybe a season of consolidation is what we need.

Wycombe were pretty poor when we played them earlier in the season and we really should have won . Will be interesting to see how they get on without Mehmeti, who I think was easily their best player. They've still got a strong squad though and I imagine it will be a real physical battle. A draw would be OK but I'd like us to win a few of our home games.

Taylor didn't train today so he will either be a sub or not be in a squad at all. Will be our 4th game in a row without a striker playing which means an easy away win.

 

[CTFCfan99]

Sercombe being back from injury earlier than expected is a bonus for us, but won't be enough to get us anything from the game I don't think.

Alfie May to score again, but Bolton to win 3-1.

 

[BarrieOwl]

Aside from the obvious game between us and Argyle I can't see any in the rest of the top six dropping points this weekend.

 

[BarrieOwl]

The 3rd tier of English football will be attended by over 130k fans tomorrow, that's not normal.

Hats off to the lot of us.