Cheltenham Town Ladies can put themselves into prime position to retain their place in the Women’s National League South as three points will put them 10 points clear of the drop as they face 11th placed Bridgwater United at Fairfax Park tonight.
Tom Davies will be keen to turn around his side’s form as they are without a win since the shock 2-1 win over Oxford United at the start of February. Since then they have lost to Watford, Portsmouth, Plymouth Argyle and Gillingham with a 2-2 draw against MK Dons sandwiched in between.
A win for the hosts will see them jump ahead of London Bees, who Cheltenham face at Whaddon Road on Saturday, and Plymouth Argyle, one place below Cheltenham. A win for Bridgwater would move them out of the relegation zone with 11th and 12th sent down.
Check out the Live Blog for the latest news.
It’s the first of six remaining games with a ten point gap likely to be insurmountable with only 15 to play for for 10th and 9th, the win will be huge in the club’s history.
Manager Tom Davies is keen to turn around his sides form and get back to winning ways:
“After any poor run of fixtures you want the next game straight away so you can go and put a positive performance in. We’re going into the next game with that desire, that little bit of hunger, that little bit of something to go and prove. Prove to ourselves more than anything.”
The last meeting between the two sides saw a 1-1 draw at Cirencester Town’s Corinium Stadium with goals from Emily Owen for the Robins and Laura Holden for tonight’s host. Davies believes that the last game will give little to suggest what happens tonight:
“They’re a very different side, they have completely different players. They’ve got a different management structure and everything. The games played on a very different pitch. It’s going to be different, that’s where we’re at with it, we are just preparing for ourselves.
“We’re looking at what we need to be doing. Our focus is just to make sure that we put on a performance irrespective of the outside noise that is there.”
These changes have done little for Bridgwater as they have only picked up four points since the last meeting with Cheltenham, with a win over Gillingham and draw against Crawley Wasps.
“We want to win every single game of football that we participate in, we want to rectify poor performances. It’s a bit of a derby game with the location of the majority of our players, from their perspective it’s got a little bit more bite in it.
“From a team and a club perspective we are not where we want to be at the moment and we want to put ourselves in a position on Saturday where we’ve got three more points and put ourselves back up the league table and into a position where we want to be in.
“It’s an opportunity to right those wrongs and put a good performance in and get three points”
The teams face off at 7:45 tonight.
