Saturday 7 March Games

[Indian Dan]

Looking like a storm-free weekend!

We’ve got FGR and Chuckles - who’s beginning to outstay his welcome I reckon. Hopefully, we can help him out the door.

Strangely, Living out here, I met a woman who went to school with Cooper. She said he was a nice fella but I read between the lines and knew she meant he was a cnut.

Looking for our 11th home win from the last 12 games. They’re on a bad run of form but have a decent away record. Should still have way too much for them.

6-0!

 

[valefan16]

Arguably the game of the weekend in L2, Cheltenham v Port Vale with both sides on unbeaten runs and have shared 9 wins out of 12 between them in recent weeks.

A win for Vale would strengthen our hand in the play off battle whilst Cheltenham are looking to push into the auto's.

Tricky one as their home record is superb but we do have the caveat of already winning there (3-1) in the FA Cup. Although we've only won 5 away, 3 of those (Bradford, Crewe and Northampton) were ones which blotted sides superb home form (plus the aforementioned cup win!)

Think we will get a draw 1-1 in this. Pope and Varney.

 

[ProfessorGreen]

Now that we're in the top 3 it would be nice to not leave it again for the rest of the season.

Home against Macc, 3 points is a must.

I can't see anything but 3 points for Crewe, Exeter should win at Walsall too but away fixtures are always tough. Cheltenham with a tricky tie up against Port Vale.

Opportunity for us to possibly gain a couple of points.

 

[shoddycollins]

Got promotion chasing Colchester at home as we rapidly tick off our remaining CUFCs. They thrashed us back in January and if anything are even stronger now. We're a bit stronger but probably not enought to avoid defeat. A draw would be lovely.

 

[JJ1532]

Stevenage at home, anything other than a win would be a disaster. Sounds greedy, but given how dire they are, I'd like a win by 3 or 4 from this to be honest. Get the confidence up ahead of a tricky rest of March.

 

[les.gtfc]

Massive game for us. We're not going up, we're not going down, so winning at Scunny is all that's left for us this season I reckon. Their fans will probably be thinking very similar.

I reckon we'll nick it 2-1. Vernam and Benson for us, with The Ginger Pig scoring for them.

 

[Chris FGR]

Personally I expect us to tear Swindon a new one. They're actually not very good and we've decided to stop pretending to be shit. Probably.

 

[Lambourn Red]

FWIW - My predictions for teams at the top this weekend

Crewe 4 - 0 Stevenage
Cheltenham 1 - 1 Port Vale
Northampton 2 - 1 Mansfield
Plymouth 3 - 0 Macclesfield
Swindon 3 - 1 FGR
Walsall 1 - 2 Exeter

 

[Bottega Don]

Half our team is out injured so I am not confident at all, we did have a lot of injuries before the away game and won that so you never know though.

 

[Si Robin]

It's a strange feeling at the moment. If, before the Northampton game last Tuesday, you'd told me we'd have 6 points from the next 3, I'd have snapped your hand off. However, that was always with the belief that we'd lose at Colchester.

Now that we could go second on Saturday, all of a sudden Vale becomes must win. Varney is likely to be missing after tweaking something last Saturday, but Reuben Reid is in form at the moment and will look to take his place. It'll be interesting to see how Vale's defence cope with Alfie May as well. His arrival is so much like that of Dan Holman from our Conference winning season a couple of years back that it's quite scary.

The biggest concern for me is Ben Tozer. He's been an absolute rock in the sweeper position this season, but he also picked up a knock last week.

Either way, for someone who tends to be negative about big games, I've got a feeling we're going to take off this Saturday - 2-1 Cheltenham.

 

[Boletus Edulis]

Bring your ear muffs to Home Park Macclesfield fans. As part of Mayflower 400, the club is giving 2020 free tickets to kids who play in the local Saturday morning league. It is good to see and they all come in their club colours. However, I suspect they will be in the blocks not too far from the away end, they are very enthusiastic and the cheering can be quite high pitched! Should, therefore, mean a crowd of 12K plus.

 

[valefan16]

It's a strange feeling at the moment. If, before the Northampton game last Tuesday, you'd told me we'd have 6 points from the next 3, I'd have snapped your hand off. However, that was always with the belief that we'd lose at Colchester.

Now that we could go second on Saturday, all of a sudden Vale becomes must win. Varney is likely to be missing after tweaking something last Saturday, but Reuben Reid is in form at the moment and will look to take his place. It'll be interesting to see how Vale's defence cope with Alfie May as well. His arrival is so much like that of Dan Holman from our Conference winning season a couple of years back that it's quite scary.

The biggest concern for me is Ben Tozer. He's been an absolute rock in the sweeper position this season, but he also picked up a knock last week.

Either way, for someone who tends to be negative about big games, I've got a feeling we're going to take off this Saturday - 2-1 Cheltenham.

You never know with Vale, we've been absolutely outstanding against the top half teams this year and have only lost twice against the current top 13 sides, in a way Vale fans are more relieved to be playing Cheltenham than Walsall or Scunthorpe because our record against the bottom 10-11 is meh.

Defensively it will depend who plays, Legge and Smith have generally been excellent this season and Smith may well leave us for Championship football this summer but we have Mitch Clarke back from suspension at Left Back so that is an option over Monty who is a winger.

Cullen has a knock so hopefully that means his holiness has to start which for me is the best option away from home (and a nemesis to Cheltenham!)

It will be a tough game, I wouldn't be surprised if we won but equally if we lost, we've generally raised our game against sides in form and ended good runs (Swindon plus the mentioned home runs we'd ended) it was a decent battle at Vale Park, although we should of won, Cheltenham shown they were good at what they do so expect a decent contest.

Probably win this, then get a flat one against Crawley based on our season so far.

 

[Alain]

Any Oldham Athletic supporters travelling to Crawley by car/coach for the game please note that the M23 is closed all weekend Southbound - from the M25 to Gatwick at Junction 7 - suggest using Junction 8 at Reigate - A217 and follow the signs to Reigate then Gatwick when on A23 travel south towards Crawley - stay on the A23 for about 5 miles from the airport and you will get to the roundabout with the large football on it - ground is on your right. No parking at the ground but plenty of street parking locally - the M23 is open northbound all weekend.

Redz Bar will be open from midday to Oldham supporters - safe trip down.

We are on reasonable form at home so supporters will be expecting a win - but anyone can beat anyone in this league so who knows - we are the draw specialists but going for a 2 - 1 win.

 

[Dave-Vale]

Hopefully we turn up for more than just the first half like we have in our last two games.

Can see our game being a draw which isn’t a bad result considering Cheltenham’s form and home record. I’d take a draw providing results elsewhere go our way.

 

[Vanni]

Come on Col U!

 

[Vanni]

Just saying like but Vale vs Cheltenham is not the game of the weekend. Neither is Scunny v Grimsby.

The M11 derby between the O's and the U's is. I'm not sure if you folks know this but there was this one time when they stole our manager, who then proceeded to take all the better players at the club with him.

And this unpleasant business wasn't even that long ago. Just the 25 years or so Just thinking about it makes me seethe with anger.........

 

[Bottega Don]

Sounds like Van Veen and Eisa are going to be game day decisions, god help us if they're not fit

 

[northstandexile]

Just saying like but Vale vs Cheltenham is not the game of the weekend. Neither is Scunny v Grimsby.

The M26 derby between the O's and the U's is. I'm not sure if you folks know this but there was this one time when they stole our manager, who then proceeded to take all the better players at the club with him.

And this unpleasant business wasn't even that long ago. Just the 25 years or so Just thinking about it makes me seethe with anger.........

M26?

 

[Rob_of_the_green]

My prediction for Cheltenham vs Vale:

There will be some kind of controversial event/decision/goal, the losing team will say they were the better team throughout, should’ve won, and were robbed. The winning team will say it was a great performance and they would’ve won it anyway.

In fact that’s also my prediction for Scunny vs Grimsby, but there’s more likely to be some self-loathing involved about how player x, y, and z are simply not good enough to play league football.

 

[Chris FGR]

M26?

Can you get from Cambridge to Leyton via the M26?

 

[Vanni]

oops, don't know what made me put M26 instead of M11. I can only hope it's got nothing to do with this pesky corona thing that everybody's talking about.....

 

[Greenacres]

My prediction for Swindon v FGR:

Swindon will win, probably by a few goals, with Eoin Doyle scoring several of them. In his post match interview Cooper will blame: our fans, their fans, the pitch, the weather, the magic roundabout (the one near the ground, not the tv programme suspected of having references to taking illegal drugs), Honda, the Great Western Railway, Jan Aage Fjortoft, Greggs vegan sausage rolls, the gammons who hang around all day in Weatherspoons, Jn13 on the M5 and The Stroud News and Journal...the list is growing by the week!

 

[darren gregory]

Just over a year since our last visit when quite a few fans turned on the players as they came over to applaud .Vitriolic abuse and fans arguing with each other as we slipped within 3 points of relegation.
Thankfully a different Vale this time and also a different home team.
Two teams on good runs.
Sit on the fence and say 1-1 with around 700 away fans.

 

[valefan16]

Just over a year since our last visit when quite a few fans turned on the players as they came over to applaud .Vitriolic abuse and fans arguing with each other as we slipped within 3 points of relegation.
Thankfully a different Vale this time and also a different home team.
Two teams on good runs.
Sit on the fence and say 1-1 with around 700 away fans.

To be fair we were mugged that day with that offside when Raglan is playing him on by about 6 yards!

That was the game though where Carol and Kevin driving back said they realised they had to do what it took to rescue the club.

 

[PlymouthCasual]

Hoping for a comfortable 2-0 result with zero injuries and zero suspensions. That simple

 

[hellogregory]

After correctly predicting us winning at Cambridge last week, I'd love to say the same for this week, but I'm with Shoddy, I think Colchester will have too much for us. Assuming Crewe don't fuck up against Stevenage at home, defeat here shouldn't be damaging so our 17 point cushion should stay intact.

As long as there are positives and we give a decent account of ourselves. Our home games need to improve as they've been on the whole dreadful this season. Any decent performances we've put together have been on the road.

 

[Hedonist Puncture]

I'll be surprised if Eisa and Van Veen play v Grimsby. Reportedly they have muscle injuries, a hamstring and groin respectively. They usually take longer than 1 week.

Hoping to see Hammill play. Read somewhere that he might be in. I was disappointed in the way Hurst treated him. With proper man management he could definitely help us.

Expecting a scrappy game tomorrow. Hope the ref doesn't spoil it. We have already won twice at Blunder Park this season, so maybe it is Grimsby's turn.

 

[Bottega Don]

Just read Holloway has never lost in his 6 games against us, I remember his Blackpool teams taking us apart a bit ago. Hope Grimsby don't play the way they did.

 

[Crewelad87]

Stevenage at home has to be the home banker of a home bankers. Stevenage have lost 8 on a bounce whilst we have won 7 on the bounce at home. Artel says apart from Nolan we have a fully fit squad so maybe we will see the return of Lowery which would be a massive boost.

Crewe 3-0 Stevenage (Walker, Porter, Powell) 4,566 (110 Stevenage)

 

[Limerick Mariner]

Just read Holloway has never lost in his 6 games against us, I remember his Blackpool teams taking us apart a bit ago. Hope Grimsby don't play the way they did.

Surely a game of this stature, at the same level as Celtic v Rangers, deserves it's own thread...