Hit the Brakes

Hereford FC make the relatively short hop across to Warwickshire on Saturday to play Leamington in a return to National League North duty after getting dumped out of the Cup in midweek. That replay, along with the earlier one against Sporting Khalsa, have contributed to a heavy workload of late for Hereford, and it’s taking its toll, with half of the squad lacking fitness to varying degrees.

The hosts have gone into the season without Jack Edwards, who for a long time had been Leamington boss Paul Holleran’s captain and representation on the pitch of the manager’s ethos in all its ingloriousness, but he's now moved on.

His absence hasn’t seemingly been felt as much as that of other talismen leaving clubs elsewhere, such as Matt Rhead at Alfreton or Michael Gash at Peterborough, as the Brakes sit above Hereford in the table having played a game less.

That Holleran ethos will still be there of course, channelled through new recruits who would presumably like to play football, yet are required to fall over, pull shirts, waste time and generally niggle in order to achieve a 0-0 draw or, when that soulless and cynical approach works particularly well, a 1-0 win. 500 people turn up to watch this version of football each week. If they tried to play actual football maybe they’d get bigger crowds.

The counter-argument is of course that they do what it takes as a smaller club to compete at step 2, and if they tried to play expansive and attractive football with the resources at their disposal they’d be relegated, which is probably fair.

After big-time charlies (but soon to be non-League) Shrewsbury swooped for the Brakes’ star striker Cally Stewart mid-way through last season they really struggled, and more-or-less stopped scoring. That goal shyness continues into this season, but nevertheless they’ve won three of their last five games.

What tends to happen to them, whether a giant of the game like the Sloppies swoop for their better players or not, is that they go on a really bad run in the latter half of the season, leading to relegation or a narrow avoidance of the drop. It’s a bit of a shame therefore to be playing them this early, before they go into freefall mode.

Another characteristic, which admittedly seems a bit contradictory given the awful runs of form they go on, is that they’re always very hard to beat at home on a pitch that often boasts a surface more bumpy than that of the Moon.   

That 500ish average attendance at the New Windmill Ground will more or less double on Saturday, and half the crowd being away fans always helps the cause – remember some of those trips to Forest Green - seven goals, Paul Parry, ‘yellow football team’ to the tune of Yellow Submarine…sigh.

This Hereford side has no shortage of desire or commitment, but it’s fairly obvious now that, injuries or no injuries, there is a shortage of quality if the side has any aspirations to compete for the play-offs this season. Guaranteed starters for Hereford wouldn’t get into Kidderminster or Fylde’s matchday squads, and the disparity between the minted and the not-so-minted seems to be widening.

The quality and mobility that Mike Parker offered during his recent loan spell was very noticeable by its absence on Tuesday. Whether Paul Caddis will be able to get him back, for an extended spell up to and including Christmas perhaps, remains to be seen, and even if that was to happen he’s recovering from a niggle (yet another!) so this game could come too soon for him.

With both Eno Eto and I-Lani Edwards going off injured against a very limited Hemel Hempstead side on Tuesday, Caddis will have spent the rest of the week attempting to find cover right across the pitch.

The piggy bank may need to be raided both to get through this injury crisis and more longer term if the board are serious about a play-off challenge this season.

Yet another minus on a a balance sheet with not much in the credit column at the moment is Montel Gibson’s midweek departure. Monty excelled himself by managing to leave two clubs at once rather than the usual one.

It could be that one of the clutch of loanees Caddis can hopefully bring in for this game will be a striker to partner Remaye Campbell. Rem as a lone striker on Tuesday produced the same result that it always does (him being totally isolated and the defenders comfortably mopping everything up).

However, given the absence through injury of Andy Williams and Gibson being ineligible, there wasn’t much choice. Hopefully on Saturday there will be that option of going with a strike pairing of the Battering Rem and a temporary new arrival whose middle name is ‘Prolific In Front Of Goal’ – OK, middle names. It possibly sums things up at the moment that one of the few fit players in the side nevertheless played the second half on Tuesday with a bandage on his head.

Incidentally, you'd assume that strike partner won't be the third coming of Montel Gibson, but who knows? 

On all available evidence, and notwithstanding the terrible luck Caddis is having currently, this is a match-up between two sides destined to finish in the bottom half of the table this season. Such is the fickleness of football fans though that a win will have us forgetting all about last Tuesday and hoping all over again. But you know what they say about hope.

COYW