NEXT HOME GAME - TBC
NEXT AWAY GAME - SUPPORTERS XI ARE PLAYING WORCESTER AT MALVERN ON SUNDAY AUGUST 3rd AT 3.00pm

Monday, November 30, 2009

Preview: Northampton vs Bulls

The Bulls travel to Sixfields on Tuesday night looking for their first win against Northampton in seven attempts.

Last season the Cobblers did a League double over the Bulls, winning 2-0 at Edgar Street last November before securing a 2-1 win in a desperate scramble to avoid relegation in April. Those wins add to two narrow LDV wins during the Bulls' Conference years and two victories in the Bulls' final League season mean they are unbeaten against the Bulls all the way back to March 1996, when Tony James (the First) scored the only goal of the game to seperate the two sides.

The Cobblers have had a management change and acquired two ex-Bulls since the two sides met at the end of last season. Stuart Gray's two and a half year reign ended in September after a slow start, but Ian Sampson has failed so far to ignite their season. He has won five of 16 games in charge to leave them 18th and two points behind the Bulls. Dean Beckwith and Steve Guinan were recruited by Gray in the summer to varying degrees of sucess. Beckwith has missed six League games with a variety of injuries, while Guinan has seven goals.

The Bulls are still seeking their first three points on the road this season. It was March when Guinan helped the Bulls to three points at Carlisle, with thirteen League matches passing since. In those games the Bulls have only been beaten by more than one goal twice and have often fallen to a late lapse of concentration just like the one that undid the Bulls on Saturday - the Bulls have now conceded 13 times in the last five minutes of either half. They have also never lost when scoring first - but have also not won when conceding first either.

Northampton Town vs Hereford United, Sixfields, Tuesday 1st December, 7.45pm.