We all follow a team against Marine

…to the tune of Yellow Submarine, like, obvs.

Hereford FC take their two-game unbeaten run into a home match against Marine on Saturday, hoping to put a bit more distance between themselves and the bottom of the league with a win.

Talk of unbeaten runs is of course fooling no-one given that the Bulls haven’t won in the league since 4 October at Leamington. That near-two-month barren patch sees them sitting third bottom, but with two games in hand over the clubs above them.

If Paul Caddis can turn things round, winning those games in hand would put the Bulls six points behind Darlington in the final play-off position with over half the season still to play. That’s one take on things! There are admittedly others, arguably more realistic. 

Marine have had an excellent start to the season and sit in fifth position. They don’t tend to draw away from home and they’re in no way prolific scorers, and, given that the hosts aren’t either, those two stats may point to a 1-0 home win, which would do very nicely.

The Mariners owe their fifth position in the table to a 2-0 midweek home win against misfiring Kidderminster.

They took a while to acclimatise to the National League North last season following promotion, and looked way off it at Edgar Street in terms of quality (not much) and naivity (loads), but quickly turned things around and finished 19 points clear of the drop in losing just two of their last ten games. There’s very little chance of them exhibiting any of that naivity this time.

Bobby Grant is their manager, and something of a ‘Mr Marine’ having also played for and captained the club.

If this isn’t to go the same way as so many other home games this season, Tuesday night’s goalscorer Aaron Skinner will be required to keep Fin Sinclair-Smith quiet. The diminutive ex-Radcliffe left-winger is having a fruitful season and will give the Hereford defence plenty to think about, as will centre forward George Newell, who Harriers struggled to contain on Tuesday. In fact they struggled and then failed, as he scored.

It was very nearly only the second clean sheet of the season at Chester on Tuesday for the Bulls, a stat which tells its own story. Signs were there that a bit more defensive resilience is emerging, but it was all-too-familiar when, in the build-up to the late equaliser, several opportunities to clear or get a telling challenge in presented themselves and weren’t taken.

If Marine are repeatedly able to stroll through the Hereford ranks almost as they please like Telford and Curzon Ashton did in recent games at Edgar Street, it would suggest that this season really could get dicey, as no progress would have been made in recent weeks. However, Caddis now has a fully fit midfield to pick from, which wasn’t the case in those aforementioned matches, and that should make a difference in breaking up counter-attacks.

He also now has Harley Hamilton and Jaiden White as attacking options, so if some defensive steel can ensure that the visitors don’t score early, there’s a platform for the creative players in forward positions (and the squad isn’t short of those) to take the game away from the Merseysiders.    

Remaye Campbell’s a doubt here, and Andy Williams may get the nod over loanee Callum McFarlane as the loan striker supported by those ‘creative players in forward positions’.

Another 2500ish gate here should see us all patting ourselves on the back, or having each other sectioned. One or the other.

Peterborough at home follows this. They’re improving and a bit bogeyish, but that’s looking like a must-win. You know, like Oxford and Southport were.

Anyway, never mind a narrow 1-0 win. This ends 3-0 to the home side with a tactically astute and attractively delivered masterclass in how to win football matches in the National League North. I’m convinced of it.

And a belated word on John Newman. That mid-80s side he managed was what got me properly addicted to this ultimately futile passion we pursue with such vigour.

Enjoying sides capable of almost inevitably winning football matches doesn’t happen often when you’re an H(U)FC supporter, but that 1984/85 side was one, GT built another, and then Beadle’s sides cantered through the pub leagues as the new club.

For Newman to have had such an effect so quickly though was incredible.

Having titled this preview with a reworking of a favourite Hereford song from history, I’ll end with one from even further back that on many occasions gave me goosebumps as a schoolkid looking across, wide-eyed and impressionable, at the Meadow End:

“Johnny Newman’s black and white army”. RIP.

COYW