After a bitterly disappointing Caring Cup defeat midweek I’m not going to depress myself anymore by going on about what we all know – all I can say about last Wednesday’s game is… ‘put the chances in the back of the net!’ With all the possession we had - AND shots it is unbelievable that we didn’t win, even Chris Coleman admitted Fulham didn’t deserve to go through, but all credit to Fulham’s keeper ‘Mark Crossley’ he was Fulham’s inspiration for ninety minutes, well-done sir!
Anyway, moving swiftly on…
Saturday will see the in form AJ returning to play at his ex-home, St. Andrews, after not playing there for over three years. I’m sure he will be looking forward to it – and I expect him to get a really good reception from the St. A's faithful crowd.
Yes, Andrew Johnson is in top form for Crystal Palace (unfortunately for us.) We do need to watch him, and make sure he has little or preferably no advances on Maik Taylor’s goal.
Crystal Palace have a great ‘fighting spirit’ atmosphere about the club at the moment, which can only boost the player’s confidence. Dowie has brought Palace on as a club; from a team that was struggling in the old first division, to a premiership team that looks more and more like staying up week by week, and so all credit to him. He will have his players up for this game, as always, and I’m sure he is going to try and get an away win.
Blues on the other hand are dropping points like water from a tap but more annoyingly not just dropping points, but getting knocked out of a cup through a game that we were in complete control of - that could have been the ideal route to Europe! ...But ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’ mean nothing, that’s all in the past so lets forget about it and move forward. It obviously wasn’t meant to be ( we can look positively at it like that I suppose.)
Blues certainly need to win to keep our heads above water. With Stan back in action, and Muzzy on his way back this is going to be a little easier; with players returning competition for places will occur, which is only good for the football club.
Saturday should be a good game, with various tackles flying in left, right and centre...
I feel Blues will have the edge over the visitors, I think Blues will have that extra quality to grab maximum points from Palace, so this week a narrow home win seems to me to be the obvious outcome.
Contact Leigh direct: bcfcleigh@aol.com