Tuesday, 8 February 2011

Hereford v Macclesfield

Before starting on the brief preview of tonight's game, I'd like to help create awareness of a fund raising activity taking place this evening. Wristbands are being sold in the club shop for £3 to raise funds for the Adam Stansfield Foundation which was set up following the death related to a form of colorectal cancer of the former Bulls, Yeovil and Exeter striker at the age of only 31.
Adam was playing for the Devon club when he died, but played 62 of his 260 professional games for Hereford and was well respected by everyone he met in the game.
Macclesfield's visit makes the event even more poignant given that they have suffered the tragic loss of manager Keith Alexander, 53, and midfielder Richard Butcher, 29 in the last year.

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Okay, so I'm back at Edgar Street (or Edgar Road as I mistakenly blogged for some strange reason - possibly tiredness or alcohol consumption related -earlier this season!) this evening for the first time in a while and it looks as though Hereford are on the up – despite the blip of a home defeat against Lincoln on Saturday.
Unfortunately for the Bulls, they could have dragged Lincoln back into the relegation scrap with a win, but it wasn’t to be. This evening though they have another chance to put another lowly club to the sword and put some distance between them and the bottom teams.
Hereford seemed to be on a little bit of a roll before Saturday’s game and had won four of their last five league games – not the sort of form you’d expect from a panicking relegation threatened outfit. It looks as though boss Jamie Pitman has picked them up for a second time this season to re-assert his own job credentials. Indeed he rallied the troops after losing to the Imps and said:
"We have also been on a good run but now we have to make sure we deal with that and get on with the next game. They had one or two opportunities but nothing else and probably we had the same.
Now we have to win our own games because we cannot control whatever our rivals are doing. Like Lincoln and ourselves, anyone can get on a run so we have to control our own destiny."
By way of contrast, Macclesfield haven’t won since they beat Bradford away back in November and have lost six of the eight league games since. On Saturday Macclesfield’s home fixture against Bradford was postponed and while manager Gary Simpson was left groaning about a possible fixture pile up, the way things have been going for the Silkmen, it’s better than groaning about another defeat.
Pitman has kept a settled line-up during the club's recent decent spell and has said to the local press:
"I could rotate but the danger is you get into rotating it like that, leaving people out and people then get frustrated. So I have to sit down with the other staff and think about what we're going to do with it all and where we're going to go come Tuesday because it's another game we need to get something out of."
Simpson will need to check on the fitness of defender Paul Morgan before the game. Morgan was carried off with swelling on his foot after just 10 minutes of last week's 4-2 home defeat against Bury.
Defenders Carl Tremarco and Shaun Brisley will remain sidelined with hip injuries.
Assistant boss Glyn Chamberlain said:
"Shaun Brisley is getting ever closer. Carl Tremarco is also progressing well and is perhaps a few weeks behind Shaun. We're going to need as many fit bodies as we can in the coming weeks as the games are coming thick and fast."

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