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Hereford FC entertain Chester, weather permitting, as the National League North fixture programme battles with the December cold snap, and in similar conditions against Chorley last week it was die-hards only in attendance.
Given that Chester are absolutely flying at the moment and it’s not too far to travel, you’d expect them to bring more than the three who came down with Chorley, and unless any of last week’s die-hards have actually died from frostbite in the interim you’d imagine they’ll be back for more, so hopefully the risk of a sub-1000 crowd will be minimal.
However, it’s clear that people are now voting with their feet having largely and patiently stuck with the now quite long-term HFC ‘work in progress’ in decent numbers so far this season. This follows a terrible run of form and results, but whilst the latter are still very ropey the former have picked up markedly. One point gained from the Darlington, Kings Lynn and Chorley games is a somewhat cruel return, and an inaccurate reflection of how those games played out. To put that right here with a win would be a clear signal that the Bulls are in a false position and capable of bombing up the table in the new year, and persuading the stayaways that it’s worth coming back out from behind the sofa to attend a game. A win against the number one form team in the league would also be bleeding typical.
Having misfired hopelessly last season, Chester have clicked this time around with new manager and club stalwart Calum McIntyre in charge. Ex-York striker Kurt Willoughby arrived at the club in the summer and has scored 11 for them so far this season. Classy Declan Weeks will hopefully be put off his stride pulling the strings in midfield by constant pestering from Jethro Hanson, and alongside Willoughby up front they’ve got a dangerous looking Shrewsbury player on loan in the form of Charlie Caton. Shame he wasn’t persuaded to come 50 miles south of the SloppyDome rather than go 43 miles north of it. Budget again, presumably.
Last time out they beat Kidderminster 2-0 at Aggborough live on telly in what was their fifth consecutive win, with Weeks and Caton both scoring, and much of what was good from Chester offensively came through Caton.
Chester’s recent purple patch leaves them third in the league, four points behind leaders Darlington with a game in hand. They’ve won seven of their last ten league matches, and were last beaten in the NLN back on 8 October, at home by Darlington. You have to go even further back, to 20 August, for the last time they lost on their travels. They are, therefore, due one, and if this is the one it’ll mean Hereford will have their first double of the season. The Bulls took the points up there in the third game of the season with a late Luke Haines Radfordesque blockbuster, and have encouragingly won the last three matches between these clubs in the NLN.
Hereford continue to have plenty of luck, all of it bad, with the news that hugely promising loanee James Melhado has seen his loan spell cut short through injury. It’s unknown whether he was doing normal football training with his parent club Salford when injured, or doing the sprinting across beds of nails and through burning hoops of dripping lava that the Bulls squad has presumably been doing this season given that all the players are always injured, but he looked like a very good find. Fortunately, Thierry Latty-Fairweather can come in as a more than adequate replacement having regained fitness following a niggling burning hoop-related injury.
With only a handful of brave souls travelling to Kings Lynn, and that low crowd at home last Tuesday, plenty of fans will have yet to appreciate the talents of new arrival Marco Rus. If you’re among them, he’s well worth paying to watch even if it is a bit chilly, especially in tandem with a seemingly reinvigorated Jack Holmes.
The Spennymoor postponement on Saturday didn’t quite give the complete weekend break it might have done given that the players had done a large chunk of the journey by the time it was announced as off, but still the squad should go into this one relatively fresh, with the disappointment of that win-that-never-was against Chorley now fading from memory a little. Building on that performance with some ruthlessness in front of goal should see them get close to that elusive win here, regardless of the run Chester are on.
At the time of writing, the ‘feels like’ forecast for 9pm on Tuesday is -5, so if this does somehow go ahead thanks to Ben Bowen’s wizardry I’ll be wearing an unprecedented number of socks. I will, however, happily throw them all jubilantly into the air at the final whistle if Hereford have scored more goals than Chester at that point.
COYW