Tranmere Rovers Preview

Four games, four wins and top of the League, not bad for two weeks work although with equal goal difference between us and Leeds its just our one more goal scored, we have got 9 they have 8, that has got us there.

A few weeks back I highlighted Leeds as the biggest team in League One and with Simon Grayson starting his first full season at Elland Rd looks like they will be our biggest threat. In their 4 games they've beaten two of our teams, Wycombe and Walsall, as well as Exeter (10th) and Tranmere (21st). So at the moment there's nothing to choose between us. This weekend they face a difficult away game at Colchester but they came through a tough game against Watford in the League Cup on Tuesday, winning 2-1.

So who's next for the Addicks? Well, at the beginning of the season Parky would probably have earmarked the fifth game, away at Prenton Park against Tranmere Rovers, as our toughest test in August. That's due to Rovers' home form last season, where with 15 victories ( only Leeds won more at home) and only 3 defeats at Prenton Park they had one of the best home records in League One.

And that home form nearly took them into the Play-Offs. Tranmere finished 7th last season just 2 points away from 6th placed Scunthorpe and could have done better because they were just 2 minutes away from beating Scunthorpe 1-0 at Glanford Park on the last day of the season. An 88th minute equaliser got the point that the Iron needed to secure their 6th place and eventual promotion in the Play-Off final.

That draw, snacked from the jaws of victory, spelled the end for manager Ronnie Moore and the new man is none other than another ex-Addick John Barnes, fresh from his success with Jamaica, who finished his playing career at Charlton and played 12 times for us in our Premiership relegation season of 1998/99 although at the time it didn't make a lot of sense and Curbs only started him twice.

Anyway, as already mentioned, the season hasn't started too well for Barnes and Rovers currently languish down there in the relegation zone in 21st place with just 3 points out of 12 from a home 4-2 victory over the Gills and it has to be said, don't really look the force that they did last year. And their good home form seems to have deserted them, as last week they lost at home for the first time since October to MK Dons 1-0 and followed that by losing away at the weekend to Leeds 3-0.

No manager, or team, likes to lose three in a row but thats exactly what Tranmere did on Tuesday by losing out 1-0 at home to Bolton in the League Cup. Barnes took the game very seriously and fielded nine of his regular team but suffered as Bolton scored for the first time this season. And Tranmere's tough season continues with the visit of the league leaders.

Form

Tranmere lost 2-0 at Yeovil on day one of the season and then beat the Gills 4-2 at home before surprisingly losing 1-0 to MK Dons, their first home defeat in 18 league games since they lost to Millwall in October. They have also disposed of League Two Grimsby 4-0 at home in the first round of the League cup.

Whats Their Secret?
Back in 1995 Alan Hansen famously declared that "You can't win with kids," but this is clearly not something that John Barnes believes in. His defence in particular is very young with the keeper a 21 year old loanee from West Brom, Luke Daniels, while fullbacks are the on-loan ( from Man City) 20 year old Shaleum Logan and 18 year old Aaron Cresswell and in central defence is the 18 year old Gavin Gunning. But Barnes does mix age with youth and adding experience to the defence is a Jamaican legend, the 36 year old Ian Goodison with no less than 113 international caps to his name. Should be interesting to see how he copes with fellow Jamaican Deon Burton with only 59 caps to his name, but 4 years younger.

Who Are Yeh?
There's very few players in League One that have played at Madrid's Bernabeu but number 10 Alan Mahon is one of them when he appeared there in 2000 as a member of Sporting Lisbon's Champions League team, they lost 4-0 and Mahon played the first half. Now 31 he's also experienced Premier football with both Blackburn and Wigan as well as playing for the Republic of Ireland twice and is another old hand in the team amongst all those youngsters.

Another player with Premiership experience is 25 year old number 11 John Welsh. Ex-Liverpool he's also played in Europe and has also captained the England U-20's but after injuries now finds himself at Tranmere, a club he joined in the summer.

Like ourselves, Tranmere have a settled side and have used only 16 players so far. Another of the regulars are right winger Chris Shuker and new signing ex-Luton and Wednesday midfielder 32 year old Paul McLaren.

Dangerman
After his eleven goals last season, this years top scorer - and captain - is their number nine Ian Thomas-Moore with 3 goals so far. The son of former manager Ronnie, he changed his name from his more well known Ian Moore (just to fool the defenders maybe, or maybe he's a fan of Paul Scofield) when he got married and at 32 has previously been the subject of two million pound transfers, a bit of a rarity at this level. Strangely, he was the only regular first-teamer to be left out of the squad for the League Cup against Bolton.

And waiting in the wings is new signing and ex-Bolton/Middlesbrough/England international 30 year old Michael Ricketts, who came on for the second half against Leeds to play for his eleventh club. And it would be no surprise if Barnes choose, in front of a home crowd, a willingness to take the game to the Addicks by starting both of his experienced strikers, Thomas-Moore and Ricketts, together for the first time. With all due respect to the Leeds duo of Beckford and Becchio these two form probably the most high profile attack in League One. So a 62 year old forward line against a central defence of 65 years - such be quite a tussle.

History

Honours in all League games are even with 6 wins apiece with a wapping 10 draws but we have only won once on our 11 League trips to Prenton Park and that was back on Easter Monday in April 1975. A goal by Killer in the 19th minute gave us a 1-0 victory and kept us on course for promotion by getting an eventual 3rd place, no Play-Offs then.

Who's Saying What

Despite it being their 3rd defeat in a row, Tranmere boss John Barnes remained upbeat after the Tuesdays 1-0 League Cup defeat at home to Bolton and believes his side will become more confident as a result of their showing. He said: "I was pleased with the performance and not just the performance but the attitude and commitment of the players. Tonight they really put a shift in against a strong Bolton side and we stood up to them."

The Team
After 4 games unchanged getting us 4 victories, and only 15 players used, it would be a surprise if Parky were to tamper with the line-up and that would have been a fair assumption before Scott Wagstaff came on for Lloyd Sam and delivered a peach of a goal in just 4 minutes. But then again Parky has already said that Scott's been pushed too early last season and with that in mind he'll be content to let him play the subs role for a bit longer.

But its maybe a bit worrying that there's only really one player pushing the starting eleven for a place, although Matt Spring has been a bit unlucky so far not to get a game. Parky has said that he wants more players in the building and looking at central defensive cover you can see why, although a 6-2 win by the reserves over Palarse on Tuesday may not help his argument, although the names of those two mystery trialists has still not been disclosed.
Elliot; Richardson, Dailly, Llera, Youga; Sam, Semedo, Racon, Shelvey, Bailey; Burton.

Summary

Before the Dons came calling, the last time Tranmere lost at home was back in October but they made a bit of a habit of it back then by doing it three times in a row and after two consecutive home defeats now to MK Dons and Bolton the alarm bells will be ringing at Prenton Park and Parky will be keen to inflict a third loss. But even with the advantage as outlined by Ketts of a Cup free week, we surely can't carry on winning and I expect Tranmere to put in extra effort on their home ground to avoid an overall fourth defeat in a row so a draw looks the most likely result.

Walsall Preview

It was about a year ago now that someone lamented to me that he feared we would do a Leicester. Ever optimistic I couldn't understand his fear, but in the end he proved the better judge and we followed Leicester's example and plunged regardless into League One. But can we match Leicester's trick of climbing straight back at the first attempt, something that Man. City, Notts Forest, Wednesday and Leeds have all failed to do? Only time will tell but it took Leicester 4 games to hit the top spot last season and we could equal that on Saturday after our perfect 3 straight wins start in our 2-1 come-from-behind win over Orient, the first time we've done that since a 2-1 win over Plymouth on April 5th 2008 with two late Leeroy Lita goals.

All we have to do is dispose of Saturdays visitors Walsall who finished 13th last season with 7 away wins.

Manager for the Saddlers since 20th January this year is Chris Hutchings, best known as Paul Jewell's assistant whom he's helped out 3 times at Bradford City, Wigan and Derby County. Their first partnership was at Bradford City in the late 90's when Bradford were promoted to top flight football in 1999 for the first time in 77 years and together they managed a remarkable survival as Bradford finished their first season in the Premiership by amazingly beating Liverpool on the last day of the season.

Hutchings was then thrown into the deep end after Jewell suddenly left immediately afterwards in May 2000. Hutchings' CV, therefore, reads manager of Premiership Bradford but for only 3 months, for despite expensive signings, a bad start to the season saw them at 2nd to bottom in November and after just 1 win in 21 games Hutchings was sacked. Familar story.

But clearly Chris doesn't bear a grudge for the two of them then teamed up again at Wigan in the summer of 2001 and after winning promotion from Tier Three in 2003 they confounded the football world by winning promotion to the Premiership, and top flight football for the first time in their history, in 2005.

But it was deju vu time again as Jewell once again resigned after two successful years leaving Hutchings to again took charge in the summer of 2007. Alas the adage that lighting doesn't strike twice in the same place was proved wrong and almost 7 years to the day after being sacked by Bradford, Hutchings was sacked again after 6 successive defeats plunged Wigan into the relegation zone after just 12 games.

So after the heady days of the Premier, Hutchings now finds himself down in Tier Three and has figures of 9 wins 7 draws and 10 defeats from his 35 games in charge.

Form

A tough old week for the Saddlers with their visit to London following a 2-1 home defeat against Leeds on Tuesday. Walsall are currently 10th in the table with 4 points. An opening day 1-0 win at Brighton by an own goal was followed by a 2-2 draw at home to Southend where the Saddlers equaliser came via the penalty spot in the last minute. And they also had an early League Cup exit to Accrington Stanley away which they took seriously using 7 of the same players that had beaten Brighton.

Whats Their Secret?
They may be midtable but, beware Parky, for the Saddlers have had a very good away record this year and have only lost 2 of their last 9 League fixtures away from home last season dating back to the beginning of February. And counting the win at Brighton on the opening day of this season that gives them 5 wins in those last 10 away League games.

The Saddlers, however, love shooting themselves in the foot after making good starts. Four games gone now and they have scored first in all of them but have only won once and lost twice. And to add to their generous nature, or perhaps the reason for it, they have had 2 sendings-off already. They were 1-0 in front in the League Cup at Accrington before captain Rhys Weston got himself a second yellow and they did it again last weekend when again leading 1-0 against Southend when Dwayne Mattis was sent off for a second bookable offence after an hour. A last minute penalty saved the day although that was after Lee Barnard levelled for Southend after home keeper Clayton Ince inexplicably threw the ball straight to him.

Who are Yeh?

Michael Ricketts, since transferred to John Barnes' Tranmere, and number 10 Troy Deeley were last seasons top scorers with 12 goal each. Deeley won Young player of the year last season and also got the goal of the season.

In goal will be 37 year old Trinidad and Tobago international goalkeeper Ince. At 6' 4" he's a commanding presence and set a club record of 22 clean sheets in 2006/07 and last season won the Player of the Year award. But after gifting the equaliser against Southend last weekend the fans debate continues regarding his Grobbelar-like abilities. Another giant, 6' 5" Rene Gilmartin waits in the wings.

In fact they are a team of giants with only Steve Jones and Troy Deeley less than a reported 6 feet. In midfield, assuming he's served his suspension against Leeds, will be the naughty number 8 Dwayne Mattis.

History
Of the 12 games played at the Valley, Walsall have won 4 of them, the last game being that embarrassing 1-2 3rd Round FA Cup defeat in January 2002 and it wasn't the first time that they have won at the Valley in the Cup, for 1987 also saw a cup exit at the Valley (oops, that was at Sainburys, of course) at the hands of the Saddlers. In League games at the Valley, its a bit more encouraging with 5 wins, 2 draws and 2 defeats and the last time we meet them at the Valley in the League was our Championship winning season 10 years ago when we won 2-1 on the 6th of November 1999 with goals by Hunt and Stuart after Walsall had gone in front. That was our 10th win of a wonderful season.

And overall its 9 wins, 4 draws and 5 defeats.

The Team
No injuries are reported so there seems no reason for Parky to make any changes to a winning team, unchanged now for all three League games and what a contrast with last season.

But are there any weaknesses? Our defence has experience, our 5 man midfield good techical ability and although we are playing with Burton alone up front our midfielders are scoring and we are 4th highest scorers in the League. But even if we were to play Norwich or Brighton tomorrow I can't see us getting 7 goals even with 3 strikers waiting on the bench. So our weakness is still a lack of goalscoring strikers and although we have some cover in midfield in Spring and youngster Stavrinou our central defence cover, if you ignore playing people out of position, consists of Yado Mambo.

But if you doubted Parky's ability to get them in the right frame of mind then Brisbane Rd should have put your mind at rest, particularly with his calming halftime talk. In fact, the only blip so far, for me anyway, has been the strange move to 4-4-2 against Wycombe by the intoduction of Gray and McLeod when leading 3-1, when with tiredness creeping in a new midfielder was needed to secure the points.

Elliot; Richardson, Dailly, Llera, Youga; Sam, Semedo, Racon, Shelvey, Bailey; Burton.

Verdict
After three games against teams that have only won once between them in 9 starts, as spotted by johnny73, it clearly hasn't been the most difficult start to a season and we need another win over a mid-table side this weekend to give us headroom before the games really start getting difficult with Brentford (h), Southampton (h) and Norwich (a) on the horizon (OK, the last two shouldn't be too difficult), but then there's a very sticky October with difficult away games at front runners Colchester and Leeds and a local derby at Gillingham and before that a tricky home game with high scoring Huddersfield.

And as a pointer to the next two games, Leicester, in whose footsteps we carefully tread, only managed to take a single point from their corresponding fixtures last season against Walsall (h) and Tranmere (a).

So to reiterate, a win then on Saturday could see us go top as Colchester face a difficult trip to unbeaten MK Dons and providing Leeds don't overhaul our one goal advantage at home to Tranmere a win should see us at the top of the table. Verdict then....another 2-1 win with goals by Bailey and Racon.

Leyton Orient Preview

A terrific result at the Victoria Ground and one that gives us two League wins in a row for the first time since Dec 2007. And I have to say that 2-0 is my favorite scoreline, there's no going over the top, its workmanlike, controlled, and professi0nal (according to Parky ) and another step towards our goal. There were 6 of them back in 1985/86 that got us promotion when we finished 2nd to Norwich in the old Second Division. And with our transfer embargo and the unsettling takeover talks behind the scenes, perhaps its Lennie Lawrence that should be Parky's comparison instead of you know who.

Next up are Leyton Orient and after visiting the smallest ground in League One at Hartlepool, Brisbane Road, sorry Matchroom Stadium, is another of the five grounds with less than 10,000 capacity (along with Brighton, Exeter and Yeovil) and with nearly 3000 away tickets sold, we could be in the majority if Saturdays 4061 crowd is anything to go by.

So can we make it 3 League wins on the spin in the local derby? Manager at the O's is Geraint Williams who took over in February after the sacking of Martin Ling. After a short spell managing Colchester, his record at the O's is a credible 11 wins and 6 defeats in his 20 games in charge. And don't be a bit surprised if you see a little more banter than usual between the two opposing managers on Tuesday. For Williams it was that played assistant to Parky at the said Colchester during their amazing promotion to the Fizzies (Tier Two) in 2006 before Parkinson flew off on his disastrous six-month stint in charge of Hull City later that year.

The O's are currently 12th on 3 points and finished 14th last year with the lowest number of home wins in League One (6) and only Colchester and bottom club Hereford had more defeats at home than their 11. Not good at home then, as even the Addicks had 6 wins finishing bottom and had less defeats, 9.

Form

So last seasons just below mid-table finish appears to have been down to their away form and so it proves with their 9 away victories. So perhaps we shouldn't be too surprised that the O's season has started with those two away wins at Bristol in the League and top of the table Colchester in the League Cup. A very good 2-1 away at Bristol Rovers on the opening day, (goals by Melligan and Smith), then another 2-1 away win at Colchester in the League Cup with goals by Patulea and Melligan.

But, once again it was their home form that let them down at the weekend losing 1-2 to Oldham after Oldham had lost their previous away game 0-1 to Carlisle.

Who Are Yeh?

One name may be familar and that's number 9, Scott McLeish. Back in 1994/95 he made 6 sub appearances for the Addicks. Then aged 20, he's now the same age as our Christian D and has been around a bit with the likes of Barnet, Colchester, Northampton and Wycombe for which he scored around 40 goals for each of them. Not got on the scoresheet yet for Orient, so expect one from him tomorrow.

They also have ex-Chelski starlet Jimmy Smith (number 20), who has finally given up on the Russians and their constant loan deals ( he's been at QPR, Wednesday, Norwich and Orient on loan) and has signed a permanent deal with the more exotically-named Orient. And keep an eye out for centreback number 5, Tamika Mkandawire from Malawi, last seasons player of the year.

There's four new boys in during the summer -McGleish, Chorley, Smith and number 23, Romanian striker Adrian (?) Patulea signed from League Two Lincoln.

History

Only 18 years in the same League mostly Division Two with the totals at Brisbane Road showing 5 wins, 6 draws, and 7 defeats. Our last League game against them at Brisbane Road was in the old Second Division back in October '81 when a 1-1 draw, our equaliser coming 2 minutes from time by Paul Elliott MBE - his only League goal for the club. That in a season that Orient were relegated.

But of late our record at Brisbane Rd has not been good. Of the last 10 games there, League and Cup, going back to 1971 we've only won once and that in 1976, 33 years ago. In fact of those last 20 games played over the last 40 years, the O's have got the better of us and have won 7 to our 6 with 7 draws.

The Team

There's no talk of injuries except the state of Llera's head wound that opened up again at the end of Saturdays game. With no 3rd choice central defender, he's sure to be patched up again and we should see another unchanged team side.

Elliot; Richardson, Llera, Dailly, Youga; Sam, Semedo, Racon, Shelvey, Bailey; Burton

Verdict

My head says a tough local derby draw but as 2-1 seems to be Orient's favorite scoreline, how about another one but this time to the away side - a victory, then 2-1.

Hartlepool United Preview

A disappointing defeat at Hereford on Tuesday still leaves us chasing that simple joy, felt occasionally by football fans all over, that of successive wins, not now achieved by the Addicks since December 2007....70 games ago.

But after the first enjoyable hour last Saturday, things were looking up and anyone contemplating our next game and the forthcoming visit, our first ever, to little old Hartlepool wouldn't have been too worried. But then a strange substitution or two and the last 20 minutes was spent in finger biting agony and suddenly nothing looks so simple anymore.

The monkey-hangers, don't ask, finished last season a lowly 19th and after a last day drubbing 4-1 at Bristol Rovers were lucky to hang on to their League One status, finishing on 50 points, a mere point above relegated Northampton with a vastly inferior goal difference, who got nothing in a difficult away game at Leeds.

Ex-Wednesday, Sunderland and Manure goalkeeper Chris Turner ( now aged 50 - doesn't time fly) is currently in charge at the Pool having taken over as caretaker manager last December following the departure of Danny Wilson. This is his second spell in charge at Hartlepool and with 7 new summer signings he's determined to change things around here. Last time round in 1999-2003 he saved them from relegation after taking over at Easter, got them into successive Playoffs (losing in the semis both times) and then left for Sheffield Wednesday just as Pools were heading into Tier Three in the second automatic spot behind Walsall.

For those older members out there Hartlepool will be known for its seemingly eternal fight to stay in the Football League back in the 70's and 80's. Before automatic promotion from the Conference teams had to re-apply for re-election to the Football League in a vote taken by other members of Tier Four. After several years of being voted back in however by this old boys club, an agreement was reached in 1987 that the following year the voting system would end and automatic promotion would take place and somehow the Pool pulled themselves together since then and have survived the drop.

Because of their inevitable flirt with a Conference death sentence every year, Hartlepool share with Lincoln City the embarrassing record of the total number of applications for re-election, 14 in all. But another record that the Pool share with another club is in the total number of successive League games without a win, 18. A number that you may remember from last season because they share the record with... yes, you guessed it, us.

Form

A credible goalless draw at MK Dons last weekend, where Paul Ince was hoping to improve on last years 3rd place, was followed by an even more impressive 1-0 win at Coventry in the League Cup on Wednesday. So two games in and no goals conceded and they'll be dying to arrive at the Victoria Ground, capacity 7691, to get their first 3 points of the season. And you'll be pleased to learn, as you set out on the 262 mile journey to Hartlepool, that last season nobody conceded more goals at home in League One than the Pool with their 40 goals let in. But before you get dreaming of a goalfest with Burton, Gray, McLeod and maybe Dickson all on the scoresheet it has to be pointed out that oddly enough only one team, Leeds, scored more at home as well - Leeds 49, Pool 45. Expect another 5 or 6 goal thriller then.

Who are Yeh
Turner has made 7 new signings during the summer in Neil Austin, Scott Flinders, Peter Hartley, Leon McSweeney, Jon-Andre Fredriksen, Adam Boyd and Denis Behan and six of them walked straight into Pools team last weekend with Adam Boyd getting the goal at Coventry coming on from the bench. Boyd, aged 27, has returned to Pool after adventures at Luton and Orient and when a boy star at the Pool was once valued at one million. He'll start on the bench but keep an eye on him, Parky.

Central defence will be Liddell and and Collins, midfield Fredriksen and Sweeney and the strike force, new boys, McSweeney and Behan. In contrast to the injury worries at the Valley and the supposed logic of fielding the second string for League Cup ties, Turner choose to field at Coventry exactly the same starting eleven as the previous Saturday.

History
A quiz first of all. Which is the odd one out of this little lot - Wycombe, Luton, Yeovil, Hereford and Hartlepool - Yes, thats right, the Pool are the only one that we beaten in League Cup ties in the last 4 years. And with no League history to look at, the only encounter against the Hartlepool was that League Cup tie in September 2005 which ended, unlike our only Wycombe game, with a 3-1 win. And those were momentous times. After 4 straight league wins we had lost 0-2 the previous weekend at the Valley to Chelski, which if I recall correctly was a top of the table clash. And if you're feeling nostalgic, check it out here. And the following Saturday we continued with another win over WBA in our amazing 4th away win in a row.

Those were the days of Murphy and Smertin, Johansson, Bothroyd, Bartlett and Bent, stop it my eyes are coming over all funny. Goals from Johansson, Bent and Bothroyd won the day.

What Are They Saying

Not surprisingly after a surprise defeat, Parky was quoted yesterday as confirming, "We need new players. What market we shop in remains to be seen. There are players we need to move on and there are players we want to bring in to freshen things up. We're ready to do that when the time is right and we're able to do so."

Whilst up there at the Pool, Chris Turner is explaining his teams first successive clean sheets since October by saying "Its all down to organisational work on the training ground and it starts with the strikers because if they are lazy and don't work then it puts pressure on the midfield and then the back four and thats when chances open up for the opposition."

The Team

After a pre-season where we were lucky with injuries, we are now plagued with them. Richardson (hip), Llera (head), Dailly (rib), Shelvey (heel), Sam (knee) were all left out of Tuesdays defeat at Hereford.

The patched-up defence of Solly, Semedo, Youga and Basey kept out Hereford for the whole of normal time on Tuesday, and its surely the inability of the strikers to get a goal in the 2 hours played that is most worrying. Parky followed this up by saying that someone who get goals is a priority.

With the defensive trio of Richardson, Llera and Dailly passed fit then the only doubts appear to be Sam and Shelvey who weren't mentioned in the latest injury report. Sam had a good game last weekend and it was his substitution that appeared to change the game so I expect both him and JonJo to appear in a line-up similar to Wycombe.

Elliot; Richardson, Llera, Dailly, Youga; Sam, Semedo, Shelvey, Racon, Bailey; Burton.

Verdict

Parky saw the game on Wednesday and was impressed by a hard-working Pool and this looks like another game that will demonstrate exactly how difficult this league is going to be to get out of. I for one will be happy with a 1-1 draw.

Wycombe Wanderers Preview

In your dreams you probably hoped to get Leeds, Norwich or Southampton in our first game to ease us gently into life down in the pits but life's not like that is it. Almost predictably, given the past couple of years, the season starts with the arrival of Wycombe Wanderers, a team that, after winning the Conference in 1993 have, after a couple of promotions and a relegation, at last reached the same league as us. Something that would have been unbelivable a couple (or three ) years ago comes to pass and this will be the first time that we share a League season together.

So for the third successive season we start the season with a home game against a newly promoted club. The last two were Scunthorpe (1-1 draw) and Swansea (2-0 win), both champions the previous year so this time we have it a bit easy with a side that finished in 3rd place, the last auto-slot from League Two.

And it's the wily old 56 year old Peter Taylor in charge, now in his second full season and doing very well thank you. As mentioned, his first year ended with promotion from League Two, but not after a lot of heartache on the final day. After a good season spent among the top two and even being 7 points clear at Christmas, they just scraped it in the end finishing with a 2-1 home defeat on the final day to Notts County. Meanwhile chasing Bury, seeing an upset on the cards at Adams Park, only needed a 2-0 home win over midtable Accrington to grab the 3rd spot, but it finished Bury 1 Accrington 0.

However close it turned out to be, promotion is what Taylor has almost turned into an art form with the Chairboys being his latest project in his career where he has become renowed for gaining unlikely clubs promotion. After cutting his teeth during non-league spells at Dartford and Dover he took over Gillingham in 1999.

He only stayed one year but nevertheless took the Gills into Tier Two for the very first time via a Wembley PlayOff in 2000 and followed that by doing the same for his next club Brighton in 2002. Not wanting the grass to grow under his feet he then quickly moved on to Hull and did even better there by achieving successive promotions to get Hull back into the Championship in 2006. It fact, you'll be pleased to learn that just about the only blimp in Taylors career has been the 18 months in charge at Palarse, resulting in a sacking in October 2007.

Who Are Yeh!

Top scorer last season in a promotion year was Matt Harrold with a meagre 9 league goals, not a high-scoring team then. Taylor has done some re-inforcement with 6 new players being bought in. The only one you've likely to have heard off is Michael Duberry, ex-Chelski, and now installed as club captain. Of the other five, experienced midfielders Stuart Green (Blackpool) and Ian Westlake (Cheltenham) are the lastest. Chris Westwood (Peterborough), Joe Cobb (Leicester), Lewis Montrose (Wigan) are also new players.

But pre-season hasn't been too good for Taylor with four players likely to be missing on Saturday. New boy Westlake has hamstring trouble but the biggest loss will be that of Tommy Doherty with a suspected ankle ligament damage both injuries coming after Wycombe's 2-1 defeat by QPR last Tuesday. Doherty's problem will be most damaging as he was chosen League Two's second best player last season. Two others also not there will be Lewis Hunt and Lewwis Spence.

What You Ort to Know

With the same man in charge as last year you would expect the same philosophy really, so the question is, what were their strengths last year. Well, the bad news is that as an away team they had the meanest defence of everyone conceding only 17 goals in their 23 away games and losing only 5, equal with the best in the division, champions Brentford and 4th placed Bury. And with their emphasis on defence there's always going to be a large number of draws and in fact nobody drew more games than their total of 18.

So they'll come to defend and looks like they'll be few goals. They won their first three away games last year and it was the middle of October before they conceded a goal on their travels.

And there's some unbiased (?) views from ex-Striker Keith Scott, now manager of Windsor and Eton whom the Chairboys beat 4-0 in their first preseason friendly. "If you look at the way the keep the ball, they've got good movement, comfortable at sitting in and defending and they've got good pace and movement when going forward."

As for their results so far, after Windsor they beat Eastbourne 1-0, lost to Dover 2-1, lost to QPR 2-1 and finally lost to Bristol City 3-1.

Dangerman

The man getting all the goals in pre-season is number 16 Jon-Paul Pittman, the only foreigner in Taylors squad, hailing from sunny Oklahoma City. He only managed three goals all last year but has already equalled that in pre-season.

History

No league games so the only previous encounter was their 1-0 win at the Valley in the 5th round of the League Cup during our last winter in the Premier back on a cold Tuesday night in December 2006. It was Les Reed's 6th game in charge (record to date, 1W 1D 3L) and he would leave the club the following Sunday. The chance to reach the semis of the League cup for the first time in our history failed to raise the team and their goal came in the 35th minute and we never recovered.

So, Parky, we know it was before you joined us but revenge is in order for that dreadful night.

A look at the team that day less than 3 years ago makes for some stark reading. Carson; Sanfoka, Fortune, Diawara, Traore; Rommedahl, Faye, Hughes, Thomas; with the two Bents up front. The subs were Myhre, El Karkouri, Holland, Sam and Hasselbaink.

To prove that things change fast even down at Wycombe's level as well, there's only two players, one from each side, who remain from that day 2 and a half years ago. Our own Lloyd Sam and number 10 from the Chairboys, Matt Bloomfield.

The Team

A lineup containing no less than 10 internationals failed to win last time against this lot so what chance have we on Saturday? That, of course, was in the rarified atmosphere of a one-off cup game. With serious league points up for grabs, this time they'll be no messing. Or so we believe.

And we are definitely due an improvement. Looking at our recent performances over the last 18 months, we won 9 games all last season - 8 league and 1 in the cup in a total of 42 games. Add to that a further 6 wins in 27 since the December 8 2007 3-1 win over Ipswich at the Valley which, of course, was the last time we won 2 games in a row. So that's the grand total of 15 wins in our last 69 games!

We can only hope that such appalling form is behind us now and to start with we have 3 new men in a new look defence with plenty of experience. In central defence we have the 35 year old Christian Dailly with 460 appearances for the likes of Dundee, Derby, West Ham, Blackburn and last season at Rangers and with 67 caps, the 6th most capped Scottish player. Alongside him will be our very first Spanish player in 29 year old Miguel Ángel Llera, who after 8 years spent with teams on the Spanish Med coast in the 2nd and 3rd Divisions decided bizarrely to move a year ago to Milton Keynes. Strange move for someone from the heady atmosphere of Seville, but he's come to his senses and after 34 games with MK Dons he's moved to the Valley. Buena suerte, Miguel.

And there's also a new right back in 26 year old ex-Leeds Frazer Richardson. Richardson has had a varied time in his 150 games at Elland Rd, several on the right of midfield. He can score goals and has the honour of scoring the first ever goal in the 'fizzies' in 2004 after the new sponsorship deal. Last year he was club captain and was the only player remaining at Elland Rd that had been with the club during their Premiership relegation in 2004 and would appear to be a good capture by Parky.

The midfield, to our great surprise, currently looks remarkably similar to last season with probably Sam, Semedo, Shelvey, Bailey and Racon on view. The continuing, apparently, takeover talks are reported to be holding up several deals not least regarding last seasons top scorer, Nicky Bailey. Shelvey, too, is still here and has very sensibly refused a Chelsea offer of megabucks, feeling its not the right move for his career ( he really wants West Ham) - shame Scotty didn't think the same.

So perhaps our only disappointment at the moment will be our forward line where Burton, or just maybe, Andy Gray will lead the line. Grays' transfer to Barnsley, agreed 3 weeks ago is still on hold and he played the first 55 minutes at Bournemouth before Burton came on in Parkys last chance at playing his first eleven. This was Grays first pre-season appearance, after his hip injury in January, and at least seems to signify that Parky is keen to keep him. But is he fully fit to play on Saturday? Probably not, after only one pre-season game.

And finally up there in the stand, at least for the first half, will be new assistant manager Tim Breacker. Previously Holloway's assistant at Leicester, he's done some scouting for us last year but does he know that Parky's contract runs out this very summer?

The team then will probably be:
Elliot; Richardson, Llera, Dailly, Youga; Sam, Semedo, Racon, Shelvey, Bailey; Burton.

Subs; Randolph, Mambo, Basey, Spring, Wagstaff, Dickson, McLeod.

The Heart of Darkness....

Desperate moves are afoot at the Beeb.
"MacDonald, get in here will yeh. I want a word."
"Yes, boss."

The boss shuts the door behind the young reporter, quietly draws the blinds and takes a last sip of BBC tea with that touch of early morning brandy to give his voice strength. He knew this was going to be difficult and he couldn't look the kid in the eyes. What kind of hell was he sending this poor boy into? He knew because he'd seen it all before, thirty years ago when he too was the kids age; the mud and squalor, the poverty, the leaky outside toilets. But he knew that it was worse now. He made a mental note to get the secretary to get him a copy of Conrads' 'Heart of Darkness' and a DVD of 'Apocalypse Now' to slip into the kids luggage.

"MacDonald, I've got a new job for yeh. Looking after one of our webpages."

"Anything, boss. You know I'm always keen to learn. Which webpage would that be then?"

"I know you're keen on sport, MacDonald, so its one of our football ones, means you keeping in close touch with all the clubs involved and reporting, in a concise fashion of course, you know what their memory span is like, on what's happening."

"Great, boss. Which page are we talking about? Premier, FA Cup, International?

"No, MacDonald, its none of those. Its......well, ......its League One..."

"WHAT! No! But boss, please, don't. I'm a United fan, I can't do that, nobody reads those pages, they have 5 hits a month. Its a dead-end job, everyone's going to laugh themselves silly."

The Boss, knowing the reason he had closed the blinds, was not to be deterred. After the previous three reporters had all gone missing, things were looking desperate and this was his 6th attempt to find someone new to take the job and this time he was taking any excuses.

"Your names MacDonald, how can you be a United fan? What's wrong with Celtic or Rangers? Listen boy, this is your chance to make a name for yourself. With only 5 hits a month, and I have to say here and now that you've wrong there, last month it was 9 hits, the only way is up. Get a grip on yourself. Its tough but I think you're the boy...ur man, for the job."

"But Boss, what's my girlfriend going to say? She'll ditch me as soon as she hears."

"Nonsense, MacDonald. She'll be proud of you. Going out there into the Wilderness, talking to people that won't want to know you 'cause they're ashamed of where they are and you out there tracking down grounds that are undiscovered and that have never seen the light of day. Think of yourself as the Indiana Jones of League One. Or even Captain Nemo going where no man has gone before."

"Thats Captain Kirk. Boss."

"Kirk or Smirk, I don't care. This is your chance MacDonald. It'll make a man of you, it'll put your name up there in lights. The Man Who Went to League One and Survived. they'll probably make a film about it."

"But first to show we're serious and to make sure you're prepared you're off this weekend to the Army base at Aldershot for a Survival Training course. Can't chuck you in the deep end without a paddle, can we? Come on now no time to lose, the first games a week Saturday and you've got to find out where this Valley place is, you might as well start with the worst. Its probably down in south Wales somewhere, plenty of Valleys down there."

A Twenty-Eight Year Old Black Hole

For every one of us there's probably been a defining moment this summer that hit home the stark fact that we're now talking Tier Three football. Mine came a few weeks ago when the local Spanish bartender expressed surprise when I told him we had been relegated. Knowing of our recent Premiership exploits, his jaw dropped and the only words to come out of his mouth was a shocked, "Segunda B!"

Now if you've ever tried explaining the English football league naming conventions to a foreigner you'll know the problem as I tried to point out that relegation from what I'd previously told him was the Second Division means we're now in something called League One. A confused look came over his face and I knew that this was not going to be easy to explain. Because not to be outdone by the English, in Spain it's equally confusing where all logic ends after the Second Division and the Tercera (Third) Division is really their Fourth Division while Tier Three is called, as already indicated, Segunda B which, due to the distances involved and a complete lack of finance, is a regional four Division League containing many La Liga reserve teams and is clearly the back of beyond for many people.

And its not only the naming conventions that we have to get our head around. After recently reading '1421', a book that explains how the Chinese discovered the world and being told, if you choose to believe it that is, that the famous explorers Columbus, Magellan and Cook didn't exactly sail into the unknown but had maps to show them where to go, it occurred to me while attempting to put a game-by-game forecast to CAFCPicks that I didn't have a clue about Tier Three or the teams in it - I was completely mapless, so to speak, so with under 3 weeks left before the kickoff, I thought I would try to figure out exactly what storms lay ahead in the mucky waters of League One.

Last season in League One the top two, Leicester (proving there is life after death) and Peterborough, finished with 96 and 89 points respectively and into the PlayOffs went MK Dons (87), Leeds (84), Millwall (82) and Scunthorpe (76) which were eventually won, of course, by Scunthorpe, 3-2 over the Spanners.

But with all the gloom and doom around us at the moment perhaps its the other end of the table that we should be more concerned with so casting our eyes downward we find that Stockport, Hartlepool and Carlisle were the tail-end charlies, and all saved themselves from relegation by a single point all ending on 50 points, one clear of relegated Northampton.

So if you believe in fairies its a target in the 90's that's needed to get an automatic place or 80ish to reach the lottery of the PlayOffs. On the other hand if you're that bloke that sits next to me, or even Killer Hales, you'll probably be praying that we can manage at least 50.

Secondly, to give you some sort of scale of the size of things down here in the third level of english football, of the 17 teams that remain in League One from last season (ignoring the ups and downs) only 3 of them (Leeds 23812, Huddersfield 13350 and MK Dons 13550) had average gates of over 10000. (Remember Target 10000, seems like yesterday).

So obviously from the low attendances there's a lot of small, tight grounds out there in League One and we find that there's with no less than 7 teams with grounds holding 10000 or less - Brighton, Colchester, Exeter, Hartlepool, Orient, Wycombe and Yeovil. There's another 7 with less than 15000 and only 7 teams (Leeds, Southampton, Charlton, Norwich, Huddersfield, MK Dons and Millwall) that have capacities of over 20000.

The biggest club in the Division is clearly Leeds United with a ground holding over 39000 and now approaching their third season in Tier Three. Last season the prospect of playing at Elland Road obviously scared a lot of people as they won more games at home (17) than anyone else and although they only suffered 4 home defeats you could point to two of them, against minnows Colchester and relegation haunted-Carlisle, as being the difference between automatic promotion and their appearance in the Play-Offs for the 2nd year running. The season didn't start well either and they lost their first home fixture against Oldham 0-2 and they also lost to local rivals Huddersfield Town.

But, if you consider ourselves as another "big" club, perhaps we should look at their real failing last season - their away record. The warning signs are there for us to see; a whopping 10 away defeats, only one other club in the top 16, Tranmere Rovers, had more away losses.

As far as last seasons records go, of the teams still there, four were pretty bad at home with double figure home defeats - Colchester, Orient, Walsall and Brighton whilst conversely, Tranmere (only 3 defeats), Leeds (4) and Oldham (5) being the most impressive at home.

The best teams away from home were MK Dons with 14 victories, the Spanners with 12 and little Colchester with 11 whilst the worst travellers were Hartlepool (14 defeats), and Yeovil and Carlisle with 12. Makes Yeovils' 1-0 victory at the Valley last August in the League Cup even more galling. Swindon had the lowest away wins with 4.

As far as our record against these teams is concerned, the visits to Leeds, Mk Dons and Millwall (our dismal record against the Spanners is a meagre total of 11 wins in 62 league games) already look difficult before we've even started while both Exeter and Tranmere don't look good either with only 1 win in 11 visits to both grounds. And the trip to Bristol Rovers don't look promising either with our meagre 2 wins in 25 away League games.

Of the rest, there's three clubs in there that we've never played before at League level, Wycombe, Yeovil and Harlepool and there's another 4 - Carlisle, Exeter, the Gills and Oldham - who have never won at the Valley. That'll either sound encouraging to you or another banana to slip up on, depending on your level of optimism.

So, which teams are there to fear in this League Number One? Leeds must stand out as the main one to watch as the only club to make it into the Playoffs for the last two seasons. As mentioned they have the biggest fan base and a manager in Simon Grayson experienced in League One football having taken unfashionable Blackpool into the Championship in 2007 via the Playoffs. Grayson will be starting his first full season as Leeds manager, having joined from Blackpool last December.

Meanwhile the Spanners, finantially settled and in Kenny Jacketts' second full season, must be a treat also and keen to better their defeat in last seasons PlayOff final. And then there's MK Dons who after finishing winners of League Two in 2007/08 under Paul Ince and missing out in last seasons League One PlayOffs under Roberto Di Matteo will consider themselves front runners after Paul Ince was re-appointed as manager this month. Altogether we can curse our luck that the trio of MK Dons (in second place for much of last season), Millwall and Leeds remain with us and that Scunthorpe, finishing eleven points adrift of MK Dons, should have won the lottery of the PlayOffs.

So what will Dickson need to get the Divisions top scorer? Last season the hot shots were both Richard Lambert (Bristol Rovers) and Simon Cox (Swindon, now with West Brom) on 29 goals and Jermaine Beckford (Leeds) following close behind with 27, whilst you all know the dirtiest club last year would be the Spanners with the most fouls, and the highest number of Yellows and Reds shown. And over on the wing, Robert Snodgrass (Leeds) had the most assists.

Casting your mind back, the last time we were in Tier Three was 1980/81, via a touch of deja vu, after we had finished bottom of Division Two the previous year with just 22 points ( 2 points for a win). And, of course, promotion was won at the first attempt with 25 victories and only 12 defeats to finish in those days an automatic promotion-winning 3rd place in the years when the PlayOffs were just a dream in someones mind. Unfortunately, there can't be many out there willing to predict an automatic spot this time and in fact even Killer is getting nervous about an even further drop in our status. We clearly need a bit more luck this year and maybe the number 7 will provide it. Curiously, the number 7 pops up again as there are 7 teams that were still there in Tier Three from 1981, Brentford, Carlisle, Colchester, Exeter, Gillingham, Huddersfield, Millwall, Swindon and Walsall.

Can we do a Leicester then? It has to be said that with the managerial mess we find ourselves in, with the additional threat of the dreaded administration being mentioned more than once and its subsequent 10 point deduction hanging over our heads, things don't look very promising. To add to that we will need to be aware of the problem of all relegated teams where clubs will know our problems and will see us as a easy target for their aspirations and perhaps at this point it would be worthwhile remembering that Luton Town back in 1992 were a Division One team (missing out on the Premiership by one year) and finished 10th in Tier Two as recently as 2006 and now find themselves playing non-league football in the Conference.....

A Comparison Between Premier and League One

Yesterday I came across the news that one of our ex's Jerome Thomas is being 'trialled' by Premiership Hull City. After an anonymous year with injuries and only three appearances with Harry at Portsmouth on a one year deal, which not surprisingly has not been renewed, 26 year old Jerry is now a 'free agent' offering his services to anyone willing to pay.

Now I'm sure there will be many among us who would like to give Phil Brown some helpful advice to assist him during the 10 day trial period and also ask the question why he is termed ex-Portsmouth when he's pictured wearing a Charlton shirt.

The article, on the official Hull City website, consists of no less than 4 paragraphs along with the said picture and definitely illustrates, for those that want to know, how such arrangements can be communicated to anyone who cares. We were, once upon a time, (bit of a story for the children now), famed throughout the land as an example of how a football club should be run and I'm sure that you can all give me examples to prove that point. But now, although admittably in a very difficult period for the club, all we got from our recent Irish tour was a couple of A N Other's to indicate the appearance of a triallist or two in a Charlton shirt and along with, apparently, a discouragement to advertise any names if you managed to find them out.

The question is why Hull City are able to indicate the names of players on trial, where we cannot, can only further demonstate the fallen status of our club in the football world where player names are hidden from us and ex-players, even when shown in our red shirts, are described as coming from somewhere else.

Thankfully things seem to have improved over the past few days for in the current report via Forest Green we were at last spared the exact searching to find out who played for us. Former Gillingham and Lincoln defender Aaron Brown and former Sheffield Wednesday winger Wade Small were the two triallists. Whether that was because triallist Chris McCready had already shown what it takes to get a mention by actually scoring against Bray the previous Wednesday remains to be seen.

The newcomers against Wexford Youth turned out to be Swansea defender O'Leary ( if you need further info check out the splendid open doors policy at swansea) and ex-Arse left-winger Graham Barrett. Whilst we can only surmise that Spanish triallist Juan Manuel Fernandez Truy, on for the second half against Welling, has by now been shown the door and sadly sent back to Barcelona.

So, whats it all mean? Well, in just these two examples of clubs, currently in Leagues above us, along with what our players have been trying to tell us all autumn, winter and spring, it would appear to supply the answer to that question that people have been bothering you with all summer - "Whats' happened?" - for obviously the answer is that we are where we deserve to be and clearly where we, currently anyway, truly belong.

Preston Preview

Another "unlucky" result then, with a penalty save by Elliot and a goal by ZiZi the highlights, as another game passes us by. ZiZi did himself no harm by getting himself into the fizzy team of the week although there must be question marks over Parky's continuing use of a 4-5-1 when three points are so urgently needed. Then again if he had any strikers scoring goals there won't be any argument, but of course we don't.

So with only 2 wins in the last 28 League games and, thanks to Barnsley's win over Palarse, now 14 points adrift of the safety net of 21st place ( but with a game in hand!), Parky will fight on till the maths rule out any lingering hope of a miracle although the Board should by now be preparing the club for the return to League One after our 28 long years away, and surely all we can speculate on now, apart from ghoulishly forecasting the exact date of our official demise, is exactly how many of Saturdays players will still be around come August.

Precious few perhaps, as it was mentioned - as a plus point in our favour - in the Fans Forum last week that many players contracts will be up this summer, with most therefore leaving on a free and with the fizzy big spenders grabbing whatever choice players remain, we face the prospect of a team built around Elloit, Youga, Wright, Fleetwood and the never-say-die Matty Holland, soon to be 35. The shame is that with Bailey, Racon and ZiZi now playing we have a team that at least can be called one. ZiZi is a cert to go but will Hudson, Shelvey, Racon and Bailey form the heart of the team next season or will they be sold off to the highest bidder?

And judging from the bloggers recently there won't be many turning up in the stands cum August either, with dejection and apathy reaching levels we haven't experienced for decades.

So as a bit of a pick me up perhaps we should take a look at Leicester now 9 points clear at the top of League One, as a case to follow. Far from keeping all of their team from last season, you'll be pleased to know that of Saturdays winning team at Millwall only 5 played in their last fizzy game at Stoke back in May. The question is can we rely on Parky choosing the winning 5 to retain for next season, always assuming, of course, that they wanted to stay.

Of course, there's more of a case for comparing ourselves with last season's fizzy wooden spooners, Colchester, rather than Leicester, who, rather than sitting at the top of League One are down there in 11th place, 6 points away from a Play-Off spot. And maybe even that comparison would be unfair to Colchester, who, at this point last season had 33 points, 5 more than we have, finished on 7 wins, 22 defeats and 38 points - a figure that at the moment looks distinctly distant for the Addicks.

So on to Parkys next test with the arrival at the Valley of Preston, who are currently just outside the Play-Offs in 7th place equal on points with 6th placed Cardiff but unfortunately having played 3 games more and with only 3 wins in the last 11 games have it all to do. Those three wins were all at home and in fact their only away win in the last 4 months came at unlikely Molineux 3-1 back in January. And to emphasize that problem, only the relegation-struggling quartet of Norwich, Barnsley, Watford and the Addicks have a worst away record than poor old Preston.

Current Form So perhaps its just the time to welcome Preston North End, currently the worst away team in the fizzies over the last 5 games, with only a single point gained. After reaching a top six place a few weeks back they have managed somehow to lose their last three away games at Palarse 1-2, Forest 1-2 and Southampton 1-3.

DangerMan Top goalscorer is Number 33 ex-Liverpool Neil Mellor, currently on 9 goals but with only one goal in the last 5 months and that in January, so this weeks DangerMan has to be number 26 the giant beanstalk, ex of Stoke and Hull, 6' 4" Jon Parkin, ominously carrying the nickname of "the beast" and with 8 goals in total but with 6 in his last 8 games!

Whats Their Secret? The time to attack Preston is in the first 20 minutes when have managed to score a meagre 3 goals this season but conceded a wapping 15! In fact their first half record over the season is pretty appalling for a top six chasing club and they have only been leading at the break eight times.

And this match could well be billed as the First-Half kings against the come-back Giants as, amazingly, the Addicks have been leading 14 times at the interval, with only Wolves and Reading having "won" more, while poor old Preston have sat down to their cup of tea with a leading smile only 8 times in their 38 games. Cue some choice words from manager Alan Irvine because, while the Addicks traditionally fall apart after the break, the Lilywhites do exactly the opposite during the second half because after the interval Preston have the best record of all in the fizzies with 18 "wins".

And while there remain three teams that just cannot win after falling behind - Plymouth, the Addicks and Cardiff - Preston, after the first twenty minutes, have more determination and have come back from the dead no less than 5 times to win, with only Burnley better at the job.

History You'll all remember our last home win over Preston in the old Third Division on the very last day of the season back on 29th April 1975. A 3-1 win, after being a goal down at half-time, secured third place and took us back to the Second Division at the first attempt. Happy days!

However, our home record against Preston has not been very good of late with defeats in the last two games. 1-2 last season and 0-3 in 1979. Overall its a distinctly unimpressive loss of 20-30 although they have only won nine times in 30 League games at the Valley. And Preston it was, who gave us our second away defeat of the season back in August, a 1-2 loss after we have lead 1-0 at half-time, a bit of a prophetic happening as a half-time lead turning into a defeat has now occurred 5 times this season. In fact a 1-2 scoreline has been our favorite this year with no less than 8 of them.

Team News Will we see two strikers take the field this weekend? With such a strong midfield, all scoring goals, its extremely unlikely, although the last two times we used 4-4-2, at home to Plymouth and Watford, we scored twice both times. But with Dickson falling from favour, he hasn't started the last three, and is still looking for his first fizzy goal perhaps we should have a detailed look at our strikers.

Kandol has at least scored twice in his 560 minutes played, making him our leading available striker, whereas Dickson with 788 minutes played, has just a single Cup goal against Sheffield Utd. On a par with him is Deon Burton who has only started once in the last 8, and has only one goal, a penalty against Coventry, to show for his 783 minutes on the field. Meanwhile Todorov, also on one goal back in October against Burnley, has 395 minutes under his belt but was at least seen in the last home game against Watford, his first first-team appearance since the away defeat to Norwich in December. Not a very inspiring bunch then and with so many scoring midfielders Parkys got a hard choice to make.

At least we'll see the return of Darren Ward which should be the only change from the team at Molineux.

Elliot, Summerfield, Ward, Hudson, Youga; Soares, Racon, Spring, ZiZi, Bailey; Kandol
Subs: Randolph, Basey, Holland, Sam, Dickson

Summary The start of an 8 game winning run, or another sorry nail in our League One coffin? After the promise of February when we had our best month since August will we have another month without a win? Its yet another of those must-wins games for Parky although even he must be getting a bit sick of the expression. A 2-0 win to the Addicks would be in order but who is going to be brave enough to bet on such a scoreline? And with Prestons favorite scoreline of a 2-1 win being exactly the same as the Addicks favorite score of a 1-2 defeat, looks odds-on then another 1-0 half-time lead with two second-half goals for the Lilywhites.

Watford Preview

So that's it then! Reading's 2-1 win at Sheffield Wednesday, after being 0-1 down at half-time finally means that we won't make one of those two automatic slots after all and you'll notice that the gap between ourselves and the leaders Wolves, is already an embarrassing 40 points, a total between top and bottom that is normally not expected till seasons end.

Our demise has been so rapid, and unexpected, as a look at the table on right side of cafcpicks illustrates. It starkly highlights our pathetic expectations last summer as Ken's computer programme savagely deletes the end-of-season points forecast of each punter as the games continue to reduce our possible points total.

For your piece of mind the current possible points total is 27 plus 11 victories giving us the impossible total of 60 points. I suppose it proves that we still have a mathematical chance of survival but how exactly can we conjure up a magic formulae for winning games.

As Dickson and Kandol continue our striker goal drought - our last 11 goals have incredibly all been scored by midfielders - can we expect the imminent return of midfield wizard ZiZi to make a great difference. It's expecting a lot of one player so perhaps we should partner him up front with Stuart Fleetwood; what exactly have we got to lose?

However, its doubtful that even a 12 point gap to safety, with relegation all but achieved, will affect a change of mood inside the camp while the maths can prove otherwise and although there are fans pleading for building a team now that will be available next season, we all know it won't happen until we're definitely down. With games coming up in March against the 1st, Third and Sixth in the table perhaps we won't even survive until April but my guess is that knowing us we'll save it till a home game before bowing out, probably Birmingham.

So we should prepare to wave a goodbye to the Big Names of English football. The Prem and the fizzies; the names that we have learnt to ridicule will have the last laugh as we leave behind the top 44 teams in the country and find ourselves reduced to a mere number - League One.

Anyway, its a welcome this weekend to the worst away team in the fizzies - apart from us that is. Watford have only managed two wins on their travels, twice as many as the Addicks, although you won't like to find out that their last one was just two weeks ago, a 2-0 victory at Blackpool.

After playing host to the leagues lowest scorers, Doncaster, we now play a team with the 6th best scoring record, a total of 49 goals. But if you enjoy goals then Watfords your team because they also have the second leakest defence in the fizzies - after us of course. The Addicks top the list on goals conceded with 58 while Watford, and Norwich, follow dutifuly behind with 55.

Current Form Only two teams have failed to win away in their last 5 away games and Watford aren't one of them (The Addicks and Brum if you're interested). Flirting with death a few weeks ago, mainly due to their cup run, they entered the bottom three but have since then exploded into form with three home wins in a row over Burnley, Swansea and Palarse all without conceding a goal. As for their away form its not great with only two wins at Southampton 3-0 in october and that second one at Blackpool 2-0 a fortnight ago that gave them three wins in a row.

DangerMan Number 21 Tommy Smith currently has 13 goals and second-up is number 9, the tall Slovian Tamas Priskin on 10.

What's Their Secret? Tend to fall asleep badly in the last 5 minutes when they conceded 10 goals, nearly a fifth of their total conceded.

History Our 1-0 defeat in August spoilt a run of 4 draws in this fixture and you have to go back over 13 years to August 1995 to find the last time we beat them at home. Their last away win against us was at Sainburys in 1990 a season in which they beat us twice. But its been a fixture with an overwhelming number of drawn games with more draws than results, a massive 22 out of the 57 league games.
The current score at the Valley ( plus Norwood) is 14-4 in 28 games. Overall its 20-15 in our favour in League games.

Team News
Expect the return of ZiZi to first team action with Matt Spring giving way although we may need a five man midfield to bolster his lack of fitness.

Elliot; Butterfield, Ward, Hudson, Youga; Soares, Racon, ZiZi, Shelvey, Bailey; Dickson

Subs; Randolph, Holland, Spring, Kandol, Ambrose

Summary A team that likes scoring and conceding but doesn't really like playing away, in a fixture begging for another draw. We mustn't loss again and with both teams badly needing points we'll maybe need to score twice to get anything out of the game. Will Parky chance ZiZi and maybe Fleetwood, both fresh from the reserve game on Tuesday? Its fast approaching a time for a bit of daring-do and what have we to loss?

Doncaster Preview

This is clearly the time of the season when the primitive survival instincts kick in so to speak. When at long last the players, of all teams, start to realise that unless they pull their socks up they're gonna get relegated and maybe looking for a new job.

It happened last season as well. Preston sitting in the third from bottom slot with a meagre 33 points from 32 games suddenly woke up and got 23 points in the remaining 14 games. Sheffield Wednesday was another one. Fourth from bottom after 32 games on 35 points they accelerated away with 20 points in the last 14 games. All this meant that Leicester's fairly good haul of 18 points in the same 14 game period wasn't enough and they went down on 52 points!

And unfortunately for us the same thing is happening this year with Saturdays astonishing treble of the previously struggling trio of Plymouth, Forest and Southampton all winning 1-0 games against the cream of Wolves, Reading and Cardiff and making our solitary hard-earned point at Swansea look pretty dismal in comparison.

Of course, our next opponents, Doncaster Rovers, have woken up a long time ago. It's maybe a struggle to understand what sort of spirit they put into the Christmas pudding up in Doncaster but whatever it is its had a profound effect on the form of the local football club. There they were on Christmas Day rock bottom of the fizzies with only 4 wins from 24 games and only 16 points ( and only 11 goals, scored at never more than one a game). And as they travelled down the motorway to Nottingham on Boxing Day game they were also definitely headed back to League One with a pig-headed determination only understood in Yorkshire.

Amazingly, they scored four goals that day - a figure that would normally have taken them 8 games - and no less than three in the first 45 minutes to sink Forest 4-2.

And they haven't looked back since that day because over the next 4 weeks they dispensed with Burnley 2-1 (h), Southampton 1-0 (a) and than a 1-0 win at Bramall Lane to win four in a row and jump out of the bottom three. In fact, since that extra helping of invigorating Christmas pudd, they have suddenly become world beaters with 8 wins out of 10 and a total of 18 goals in the last 10 games.

And after their 2-1 comeback win at home to Derby last friday they now sit very comfortably in a midtable 15th place with no less than 9 teams below them, a situation that looked laughable before Christmas. And I know because I was doing the laughing when a Rovers mate told me back then how unlucky they were..

But this upward motion may be one point in our favour as they hopefully approach the time when midtable sides tend to take their foot off the pedal and lose concentration and relax a bit.

On the other hand it must be said that, although they are still the lowest scoring team in the fizzies with 29 goals, they have scored in every one of their last 10 fizzies.

Current Form Its the time in the season when the leading clubs start getting nervous and the bums all start fighting for their lives so the current form table is currently being turned upside down with top teams like Wolves and Brum on the same number of wins in the last 8 games as the Addicks. And while we can take some comfort as the Addicks rise to 18th in the current-form table with 8 points from our last 8 and remain unbeaten in three, you have to blink to see that todays opponents Doncaster have now enjoyed 6 wins in the last 8 (equal in their points haul of 19 with the best of all, Bristol) and with only 2 defeats ( to Swansea and Aston Villa in the Cup) in their last 14 games.

DangerMan Top striker is number 14 Paul Hefferman on 7 goals in all competions while midfielder Brain Stock is also on 7 with three of them penaties.

What's Their Secret? Not a second half team and like the Swans if they are losing at half-time they never win. And not so hot at the end of games either where they have conceded 11 goals in the last ten minutes of games and have scored only one.

History There's only been two games between us at the Valley, and Doncaster are another team from Yorkshire looking for their first Valley win. The two games played so far have given us a 2-0 win in 1957 and another 3-0 win pre-war. Overall its 3-1 in our favour and of course we have the chance of our first double of the season after our 1-0 back in September at the Keepmoat that does seem a long way away now.

Team News
Just when it seemed that we were getting a settled defence to build on, injury-prone Graeme Murty departs the scene and is immediately replaced by a Palarse full-back. The 29 year old Danny Butterfield has apparently played 30 times this season for Sainburys including turning out at the Valley in January. Whether he goes straight into the team is not clear but he's certainly fit as he's featured in Palarse's last 4 games although mainly as a sub and in midfield at that. The only other option, unless Matty Holland tells us he used to play full-back back in his youth days, is Moutaouakil who can't be called Parky's favorite as he's only played in 5 out of the nineteen games of Parky reign so expect Butterfield to step in.

Elloit; Butterfield, Ward, Hudson, Youga; Soares, Racon, Spring, Bailey; Kandol, Dickson.
Subs: Randolph, Holland, Shelvey, Sam, Ambrose

Summary So as the gap to safety grows to Grand Canyon proportions and becomes a chasm of 10 points (but with a game in hand), we just can't afford to leave the escape act any longer and this game is as near a must-win Cup Final for the Addicks as an appearance at Wembley. And what Parky plans to tell the players before the game may well decide the outcome as we all know that building up pressure is not always good for a player. This game will therefore need players that can perform under that pressure and that may well decide his starting eleven as the fans will be expecting another three points after our successes over Palarse and Plymouth.

And although Wyn sees the next four games as deciding our near future I can't help thinking that this game is crucial to the Addicks. We need a win.

Swansea Preview

A two game unbeaten run now with no goals conceded and four points in the bag and Parky was clearly pleased with the result at Oakwell.

Blustery conditions perhaps making it a scrappy game but be careful Parky that the games don't run out on you. I did say last week that defeat against Barnsley was unthinkable and perhaps Parky took me to heart with some stout defending and a late surge that failed to get the goal that the baised reports say we deserved.

The fact of the matter is that we've now visited seven of the nine teams that have the worst home records in the fizzies - Blackpool, Forest, Plymouth, Barnsley, Doncaster, Norwich, Sheffield United (we're the eighth and Southampton are still the worst of all) with only a single win to show for our efforts and a total of six points from the 21 available. The words relegation form come to mind.

And before you get all excited about our back to back clean sheets, it must be pointed out that there's nobody better to play when wanting to defend than the duo of Barnsley and Plymouth who have the highest number of no-score games in the fizzies - Barnsley with 15 and Argyle with 14.

By contrast Swansea have only no-scored on nine occasions this season with the Addicks, surprisingly only one worse on 10. But obviously your next question would be - so how are Swansea at home? Labelled the fifth best in the fizzies on points won at home from 8 wins and 8 draws they also have the worrying statistic of least number of home defeats - only a single reverse all season and that to Birmingham 2-3 back in November after being in 2-1 in front at half-time.

But that large number of home draws does tell a story. It speaks of points lost when a win was at hand. In fact the Swans are the fizzies draw specialists with 15 - three more than anybody else - and have dropped more points than most from a winning position. Of course, we've well aware of exactly which team is currently the worst at giving away games, us of course. Seven times we've lost after going in front - against Preston, Wolves, Sheff.Wed, Brum, Sheff.U, Burnley and Bristol - , but take heart 'cause Swansea have similar problems and there must be something in the water in Wales because both Swansea and Cardiff have drawn the most games after leading, the Swans on 7 and the Bluebirds on 8.

Current Form A team with only one defeat in their last 15 fizzy games - a 0-2 defeat at Vicarage Rd on 17th February, although it should be pointed out that a massive nine of them were draws, including 8 draws in a row that would have bored even Curbs.

Who They Got? Overlapping fullbacks, high scoring midfielders and a hotshot striker. There's plenty here for Parky to get worked up about with the classy midfield of number 7 Leon Britton, number 14 Jordi Gomez and 24 Joe Allen probably the most important. It's these three that made the team tick and provide the chances for the strikers. And, although we don't usually get a look in, the fizzy team-of-the-week last week included the on-form loanee from Espanol Gomez ( as well as two Southampton players...).

They have a couple of injury doubts, however, with "influential" skipper Monk, who missed the 3-1 Championship win over Doncaster last weekend with a back problem and failed to recover in time to play aganst Fulham. Midfielder Joe Allen also missed the Cup game after he picked up a thigh strain against Doncaster.

DangerMan While we've been wasting our time for most of the season on 2 million man Varney, Roberto Martinez has been doing what appears to be excellent business in obtaining, at next to nothing prices, a couple of real hotshots for us to worry about. West Indian international Jason Scotland from Trindad and Tobago was somehow prised away from St. Johnston in the summer of 2007 for a reported 25k after a record of a goal every two games and is currently on 19 for the season and heading towards a repeat of his massive 29 for the Swans last year and behind him there's youngster Jordi Gomez, on loan from Espanol, on 15 in all games clearly enjoying his stay in Wales. And if you thought that maybe players hailing from warmer climes, wouldn't be enjoying a Welsh winter very much then think again, Scotland is on 14 goals in his last 15 games while Gomez has scored 5 in the last 5 games which is not at all bad for a midfielder. .

What's Their Secret Well, Parky, although they are billed as the third highest scorers in the fizzies with 49 goals you've come to the right place if you want to scrape another of them draws. Nobody can better their number of goalless draws, five in all and their favorite score is 1-1, and there's been six of them. So you won't be surprised to learn that there's only a couple of teams, Blackpool and QPR, with more stalemates than Swansea at half-time - seventeen now in all. The Addicks by comparison have been leading 12 times and drawing only 8 at the break.

So while they may be content to reach 45 minutes playing pretty football it has to be said that if you want to win this one Parky, you have to hit 'em before the break. Watch out for the first 5 minutes - they've scored 4 times in the first 3 minutes - and then impress on everyone the importance of getting a goal. And the reason for the rush? Because they've only been losing 6 times at half-time but have failed to win only of them.

History Another place where we've only won 4 times (with 12 defeats) and our last win there was 1965, 44 years ago...

Having said that, we don't play each other very often and since that 3-1 win there's only been seven games, of which we've only won a couple including this last encounter 2-0, back at the Valley in August.

Overall, we're in charge, the score being a close 16-15.

What're They Saying Martinez after last weekends home win over Doncaster "We saw plenty of character and without a doubt that was our best performance of the season." Opps..

As for Parky his comments after Barnsley draw were, "There are a lot of positives for us, the attitude of the players was excellent and we looked a strong side. There were no weak links and we looked a strong and resilient side and we had a couple of chances to go and win it but it just didn't quite fall for us."

Team News

Sorry Toddy, but Leon Burton returns from his one game suspension and will take your place on the bench. As for the starting eleven, with no substitutes used last Saturday because "the balance was right", its odds-on for another unchanged side this weekend.

Maybe they'll be a place on the bench for ZiZi although this weeks been pretty quiet on that front so with two vital home games coming up it could be that Parky's keeping him in reserve .

Elliot; Murty, Ward, Hudson, Youga; Soares, Racon, Spring, Bailey; Kandol, Dickson

Subs: Randolph, Holland, Ambrose, Shelvey, Burton

Summary A bit of a toughie then against a stylist passing team that have only suffered one home defeat, against Birmingham, all season. They've had a disappointing week being knocked out of the Cup on Tuesday by Fulham, and maybe that'll have tired them out physically and mentally, because that defeat was only their second in 19 games but the second in 10 days and another bonus may be the slight physiological advantage in having beaten them already this season.

But after the luxury of playing the relative blunt attack of Plymouth and Barnsley, it'll need 90 minutes of outstanding defending to keep this lot from scoring when you consider that only Coventry have stopped them in their last 11 home games in which they've managed to score no less than 25 times....

Barnsley Preview

A disappointing week so far for the Addicks and that's without a ball being kicked. On Tuesday the likely trio of Doncaster, Watford and Barnsley all accelerated into the mid-table distance with wins over Bristol, Swansea and Wednesday while the only jokers in the Tuesday pack proved to be luckless Plymouth Argyle who lost yet again. One out of four is not really what we had in mind but at least the one loser was the one suffering the most from frightening form. Argyle, without a win since Boxing Day and sinking like the proverbial stone, continue to relentlessly close the gap to the Addicks with a 1-3 home reverse to Palarse. Never were we more pleased to see Warnock win.

And then on Wednesday Derby failed dismally to join in the fun and games in the struggling pack with an enormous 4-1 victory over 38 point Blackpool. Both now have the same points which cannot be said of Forest another team who have forgotten how to win after their four wins in a row with only a single point now from their last 4 games.

As for Barnsley, after stinging defeats to Southampton (h), Norwich (a), Ipswich (h) and Bristol (a), no less than five players were dropped and the newcomers turned it around with a 1-0 win at Hillsborough, their first game in February, and lifted them up to 18th place on 35 points and still with a game in hand over most of their fellow strugglers.

However, the Tykes remain a low scoring team with only 9 goals in their last 12 games ( even the Addicks have managed 12) with a total of only 30 goals in the fizzies - only 3 teams are worse - with the Addicks currently on 34. Another plus for us is that while the Addicks have only failed to score 9 times, Barnley are the worst non-scorers of the fizzies - along with hapless Plymouth - with a massive 14 games goalless games.

Current Form The Tykes were looking a bit rusty recently with only 2 wins in the previous eleven but a short trip over to Hillsborough on Tuesday certainly soon cured that. The recent run of four straight defeats was ended with a 1-0 win courtesy of "a moment of brilliance from Barnsley's Jamal Campbell-Ryce" according to the beeb and obviously showed that their three weeks rest - thanks to their game against Palarse called off because of snow and then the clash with the Blades postponed because of their cup tie with Hull - has done them a world of good.

Who They Got Then? Its the United Nations of Barnsley or is it the football equivalent of Noah’s Ark with a couple of players from 7 countries plus the odd one from Germany, Iran and Argentina tossed aboard at random while a stray couple from England also appear on the boarding list. Manager Simon Davey is certainly promoting a mixed bunch at Oakwell featuring a German goalkeeper, Heinz Müller; a Dutch right-back, Van Homoet; a Jamaican, Darren Moore, as well as the Brazilian Dennis Souza at centre-back; another Brazilian, De Silva in midfield along with the Moroccan Mounir El Haimour, the Argentine Hugo Colace, and the Spaniard Diego León. Ah, and the oddity of two Englishmen who both insist on being called Irish, midfielder Martin Devaney and striker Jon Macken. As for the statutory Englishmen they've the two defenders Bobby Hassell and Robert Kozluk.

Up front, joining Jon Macken are the Nigerian, Kayode Odejayi and Daniel Bogdanovic, a Maltese international born in Libya. To add to the cosmopolitan atmosphere, three new additions in the January window included Andranik Timotian, an Iranian midfielder from Fulham, the Maltese mosquito Michael Mifsud from Coventry and an Englishman, well scouser, Adam Hammill, a left winger from Liverpool.

DangerMan? Although without a goal in 8 the current top scorer is the Manchester-born Irishman Jon Macken on 6 but there's a bit of a drought going on as he's only scored twice in the last 14 games since he put two past us on November 1st in Barnsley's first ever win at the Valley. Sadly, then, after the recent arrival of the two Maltesers - internationals Bogdanovic and Mifsud - he only managed the bench on Tuesday. So forgetting Macken and these two potential bogeymen, ( at your peril, Parky) step up Jamal Campbell-Ryce to the role of this weeks Dangerman. After scoring the winner on Tuesday the ex-Addick winger Jamal Campbell-Ryce is also on 6 goals for the season and is eagerly ticking off the days till Saturday to add to his total much as he did in April last year at Oakwell. As least he can give a piece of hope to the six youngsters who have this week been released by the club as Campbell-Ryce becomes the latest player to prove what we have been missing. And a bit a bad luck already is that his ban for collecting 5 yellows is not operative until their next game against QPR.

What's Their Secret? Just like us they don't normally score first and 17 times out of 32 the opposition have gone in front, exactly the same figures as the Addicks. However, unlike the Addicks who still have not come from behind to win, Barnsley have done it twice against Watford and Doncaster both games ominiously at home. We were also equal on clean sheets before Tuesday - 6 for both teams - but with Wednesday failing to score on Tuesday its now 7 for the Tykes athough they've only had 2 in the last 17 games.

History The fact that we've only won twice at Oakwell since the war - the Second big one that is - will tell you that Barnsley is not particulary well liked by past Addicks. We've only won a total of 4 out of 21 at Oakwell and you have to go back 13 years to December '95 to find the last time we managed to get three points there.

In fact, since our double over them in 1993/94, we've only won 2 out of the last eleven games, that win at Oakwell in 1995 and a 3-1 home win in August 1999.
Overall we've winning this little encounter 17-14 which, incidentally, is one of only 8 ( out of 23) we are currently winning against the present members of the fizzies.

Team News The best thing after our Plymouth success would be an unchanged team but Deon Burton is one ruled out because of suspension after 5 yellows so expect his place on the bench to be given to Toddorov. Sorry, is that one "d" or two, I've quite forgotten.

One key member of the squad on Saturday will be Graeme Murty, tasked to tie up double-barreled star Campbell-Ryce and prevent his adding to his rapidly rising goal total but with the two new Maltese arrivals obviously enjoying their new club, Ward and Hudson will also be vitally important. And in these changing times it may interest you to know that while we may talk of revenge for their first ever victory at the Valley that we gave them back in November - 3 and a half months ago - they'll only probably be two players - (Hudson and Bailey) in the team tomorrow from the starting eleven that lost that day.

Elloit; Murty, Ward, Hudson, Youga; Soares, Racon, Spring, Bailey; Kandol, Dickson

Subs: Randolph, Basey, Shelvey, Holland, Toddy.

Summary Sorry, Parky but this would appear to be a must win game. A point would help while a defeat really cannot be contemplated and with other teams also improving we have to as well. Revenge is also in order after Novembers' sickening embarrassment. But the new loanees at the Tykes appear to working well and with that ex-factor winger currently on fire this game could be another one that gets away from us all too easily. Close your eyes Addicks, this may not be a happy sight.