Role Reversal At The Racecourse Ground

Wrexham v Newport County

Conference Premier Division

Saturday, 1 September 2012

Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

Record League Crowd See County March On

What a difference twelve months makes.  This time last year, Newport County were rapidly dismantling the preseason expectations of their supporters as they went on a run of 12 games without a win, a downward spiral that would eventually see manager Anthony Hudson sacked and the club deeply embroiled in a relegation battle at the foot of the Conference Premier Division.  The 12 game winless streak was the joint second worst sequence without a win that County had endured since reforming in 1989, with the other 12 game winless streak coming in the same calendar year as County struggled to adapt to life in the Conference Premier.  Forward on 12 months and The Exiles, having won all of their matches in August, are top of the league and beginning to make a much more positive impact on the record book.

A combination of the new surroundings of Rodney (or ‘Dave’ as the locals call it) Parade, a successful start to the season and the visit of high flying local rivals Hereford United saw the club break its previous highest league attendance of 4,221.  Given that this gate was recorded two years ago against Havant & Waterlooville on the day that Newport County were crowned champions of the Conference South the crowd of 4,365, following on from the 11,000+ that went to Wembley in May, may represent a watershed moment for the club in terms of permanently increasing the size of its hardcore fan base.

In an open and entertaining game, Newport once again demonstrated the quality of player that they now have at their disposal.  Both sides had failed to make the most of their chances, with Len Pidgeley critically saved an early penalty and it was increasingly starting to look like a goalless draw until attacking left back Andy Sandell unleashed a spectacular 30 yard piledriver to put County ahead.  Aaron O’Connor then completed a special night for the packed crowd by netting a second in injury time, taking advantage of some sloppy play by Hereford in the midfield, as the visitors  vainly attempted to find an equaliser.

The win took Newport three points clear of Macclesfield Town at the top of the league and was Newport’s fifth consecutive league victory, a feat that they have only achieved on 12 previous occasions.  On seven (over 50%) of those previous 12 occasions County failed to extend their winning streak any further, including the last occasion they got this far in September 2010. 

However, when they seek a sixth consecutive victory at the Racecourse Ground on Saturday, The Exiles will be buoyed by the knowledge that they have one of the hottest properties outside the football league at the moment in Aaron O’Connor.  The former Luton striker has become only the second County player to net six times during the month of August, matching the achievement of Carl Dale during the Southern League Premier campaign of 1999.  Whilst Dale went on to net on 19 occasions in the league that season, as Newport finished 7th, O’Connor will be both hoping and expecting to go beyond that figure with a minimum 25 goals now being a very realistic target.

The table below is a compilation of all the Newport players since the club were reformed who have scored three goals or more during the month of August.

Year	Player	League	Goals
August-99	C. Dale	Southern League Premier	6
August-12	A. O'Connor	Conference Premier	6
August-10	C. Reid	Conference Premier	5
August-04	J. Moralee	Conference South	5
August-11	D. Rose	Conference Premier	4
August-96	A. Evans	Southern League Premier	4
August-94	L. Jones	Southern League Midland	4
August-97	M. Boyle	Southern League Southern	4
August-98	K. Bayliss	Southern League Midland	4
August-11	E. Buchanon	Conference Premier	3
August-95	D. Webley	Southern League Premier	3
August-99	L. Brown	Southern League Premier	3
August-02	N. Davis	Southern League Premier	3
August-06	J. Alsop	Conference South	3
August-06	C. Hughes	Conference South	3
August-07	J. Bowen	Conference South	3
August-09	S. Foley	Conference South	3
August-09	C. Reid	Conference South	3
August-90	C. Lilygreen	Southern League Midland	3
August-91	C. Lilygreen	Southern League Midland	3

Wrexham v Newport County Form Guide

Whilst the Conference Premier table makes excellent reading for Newport County fans, with the South Walian side having already opened up a three point gap over nearest rivals Macclesfield, Wrexham fans may have a few reservations about their side still.  In amassing 98 points last season, Wrexham became the highest ever point scorers not to be promoted.  Despite a positive preseason in which the Dragons won five times, the inevitable loss of key players from last season, such as top scorer Jake Speight and midfielder Jamie Tolley, both of whom went to Mansfield Town, dynamic midfielder Lee Fowler (who left for Fleetwood in the January transfer window), Mathias Pogba (released) and Nathaniel Percival-Knight (Peterborough United), meant that Wrexham were always likely to face a tough start. 

	Conference Premier	Pl	GD	Pts
1	Newport County	5	9	15
2	Macclesfield Town	5	6	12
3	Forest Green Rovers	5	4	11
4	Hereford United	5	4	10
5	Luton Town	5	4	10
6	Tamworth	5	4	10
7	Gateshead	5	4	9
8	Telford United	5	3	8
9	Cambridge United	5	2	8
10	Wrexham	5	1	8
11	Braintree Town	5	0	7
12	Stockport County	5	0	7

Had Tamworth’s Duane Courtney  not headed an 8th minute free kick into his own net to give Wrexham a crucial 1-0 win on Easter Monday, the table would look a lot worse than it currently does.  The North Walians are currently lying 10th in the table and face a daunting set of fixtures between now and the middle of September, with trips to both Cambridge United and Luton Town following shortly after the visit of Conference leaders Newport County.  Manager Andy Morrell will have to face these fixtures without talismanic defender Mark Creighton, whose knee injury could potentially see him miss the rest of the season and, with the transfer window due to close on Friday night, the Wrexham boss has admitted that he is struggling to capture the extra players that are needed to add depth to the squad.

Whilst early season results can often be unusual, Wrexham will feel that they should have picked up more points that they have, with the 1-1 draw at Ebbsfleet and the 0-0 home draw with Grimsby both being disappointing results.  However, Tamworth were unbeaten prior to Monday’s encounter and a second consecutive clean sheet for Wrexham is reminiscent of the miserly defence that at one point last season conceded only three goals in 14 league games.  Any notion of defence frugality though is likely to be sorely tested by the impressive Newport forward line on Saturday.

Date	Newport County	Wrexham
11-Aug-12	4-3 (A) v Mansfield Town	3-1 (H) v Woking
14-Aug-12	4-0 (H) v Nuneaton Town	0-2 (A) v Macclesfield Town
18-Aug-12	2-1 (H) v Lincoln City	1-1 (A) v Ebbsfleet United
25-Aug-12	2-1 (A) v Braintree Town	0-0 (H) v Grimsby Town
27/28-Aug-12	2-0 (H) v Hereford United	1-0 (A) v Tamworth

Previous Encounters

Newport County have met Wrexham on four occasions since they were reformed, all of which fixtures have taken place over the last two seasons.  Given that The Exiles have failed to record a win in any of these games, they must either break their duck on Saturday or see another five match winning streak come to an end.

Wrexham	Overall Record
	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	For	Against
Overall	4	0	2	2	1	3
Conference Premier	4	0	2	2	1	3

County have not only failed to record a win in their two visits to the Racecourse Ground, they have failed to even score a goal.  However, those statistics do not do justice to the quality of the performance from Newport when they travelled to Wrexham in October last season.  With Wrexham having won the previous five league games, the last three of which were done with clean sheets and with Newport having only just emerged from their dreadful run of 12 games without victory, the 0-0 draw that they fought out at the Racecourse Ground felt like victory to the players and fans.

 

 

Lee Evans during his home debut against Wrexham in April last season.

(picture courtesy of Sam Shingler – see Newport County Photos link on the right of this article for more of his work)

 

 

For much of the season, it looked as though the return clash in Newport would be decisive for both clubs, with Wrexham pushing hard for promotion and County fighting desperately against relegation.  However, by the time Wrexham visited Spytty Park in April for The Exiles final home game of the season, Fleetwood had already clinched the only automatic promotion place and Justin Edinburgh had managed to extract just enough from his team to keep them up.  Wrexham won the game 1-0 through a first half Adrian Cieslewicz strike, leaving Newport with just two draws and one goal to show from the four encounters with their Welsh rivals.  As the two teams meet this Saturday though, the roles have been reversed somewhat.  It is Newport who top the Conference having strung together five consecutive victories and Wrexham who are struggling to find some form.  Should Newport make it six wins on the trot, it will be the first time they have achieved such a feat at Conference Premier level and, despite what will be another frenetic derby, their fans will believe victory is more than possible.

Forecast

Wrexham 1 Newport County 2

Local Rivals Meet At Conference Summit

Newport County v Hereford United

Conference Premier Division

Tuesday, 28 August 2012

Rodney Parade, Newport

Rodney Parade Brings Back The Crowds

On Tuesday evening, local rivals Newport County and Hereford United will meet for the first time since Newport County reformed back in 1989 in a highly anticipated top of the table clash that could break the record for Newport’s highest Conference Premier League attendance.   The current record is 3,462 which was set in another top of the table clash against AFC Wimbledon back in January 2011.  However, the level of interest in the game means that this record is under threat, with County taking the unusual step of recommending that supporters buy tickets in advance and Hereford potentially bringing several hundred.

Although County’s record Conference Premier League attendance is undoubtedly under threat, it would be a remarkable achievement should their record league attendance be broken.  The 4,221 that saw the Exiles beat Havant & Waterlooville 2-0 to claim the Conference South championship was more than 750 higher than have attended any other Newport match since reformation in 1989.  Without doubt it was the occasion and the pending success of the club that drew the supporters out that day, as the next County home game against Woking just 12 days later saw only 1,742 attend, a drop of approximately 2,500. 

Although Newport have yet to find a way to keep such large crowds on a regular basis, significant progress was made under the Chris Blight regime.  When 1,080 people turned up at Spytty Park to see the 4-2 Conference South home defeat by Sutton United on 30 August 2004, it was the first time that the 1,000 attendance barrier had been breached in two and a half years.  Although the 1,000 barrier was broken again in the final home game of the season against Maidenhead United, it was only six seasons ago, in 2006-07, that County finally started to see four figure attendances on a regular basis.  In the light of this reality, the attendances during the relegation battle at Spytty last season, all of which were above 1,000, were perhaps not as bad as has been made out.

In any debate, there are always at least two perspectives.  One perspective on attendances is that they are on a long term upward curve.  However, there is another perspective which suggests that they are still not as high as they ought to be.  Back in May, upwards of 11,000 attended the FA Trophy Final against York City at Wembley.  Even allowing for the fact that some of this momentum has undoubtedly been carried forward to this season, with County recording their 6th (v Lincoln City) and 12th (v Nuneaton Town) highest league attendances since reforming, the reality is that several thousand people who attended the Wembley showpiece have not yet set foot inside Rodney Parade this season.  The hope and expectation is that, with the Exiles sitting on top of the Conference Premier League table and second placed local rivals Hereford United the visitors, that many more of the Wembley attendees will be present on Tuesday night.

Below is a list of Newport County’s top 20 league attendances.  It is interesting to note that, despite now playing at a higher level than at any other time since 1989, eight of the top 20 attendances were achieved during periods of success at a lower level.

	Attendance & Opposition	Date	Division	Result
1	4,221 v Havant & Waterlooville	15/03/2010	Conference South	Won 2-0
2	3,462 v AFC Wimbledon	03/01/2011	Conference Premier	Drew 3-3
3	3,206 v Wrexham	05/09/2010	Conference Premier	Drew 1-1
4	3,201 v Dover Athletic	17/04/2010	Conference South	Won 3-0
5	3,084 v Bishop's Stortford	12/03/2010	Conference South	Won 1-0
6	3,024 v Lincoln City	18/08/2012	Conference Premier	Won 2-1
7	2,903 v Bath City	01/01/2011	Conference Premier	Lost 1-2
8	2,834 v Luton Town	18/02/2011	Conference Premier	Drew 1-1
9	2,802 v York City	09/10/2010	Conference Premier	Won 4-0
10	2,713 v Mansfield Town	18/09/2010	Conference Premier	Won 1-0
11	2,677 v Forest Green Rovers	28/09/2010	Conference Premier	Won 3-1
12	2,646 v Nuneaton Town	14/08/2012	Conference Premier	Won 4-0
13	2,546 v AFC Wimbledon	09/08/2008	Conference South	Lost 1-4
14	2,525 v Worcester City	01/01/2010	Conference South	Won 1-0
15	2,475 v Redditch United	23/08/1994	Southern Midland	Won 4-0
16	2,403 v Eastbourne Borough	05/10/2010	Conference Premier	Drew 3-3
17	2,271 v Redditch United	22/08/1990	Southern Midland	Lost 0-1
18	2,230 v Kettering Town	30/10/2010	Conference Premier	Lost 1-2
19	2,217 v Tamworth	17/08/2010	Conference Premier	Drew 1-1
20	2,205 v Dorchester Town	28/12/2009	Conference South	Won 3-0

Recent Form Comparison

Newport and Hereford have made fantastic starts to the season and, with top spot in the league the reward for the winners, both sides will be confident enough to be looking for maximum points from Rodney Parade on Tuesday night. Newport County’s winning sequence stretched to four matches last Saturday, when they showed great strength of character in coming from behind to beat Braintree at the Amlin Stadium. Should they manage to beat Hereford they will equal their best ever winning sequence at Conference Level, though they are still a long way short of equaling the remarkable 14 game winning streak that helped the club get promotion from the Southern League Midland Division back in 1994-95.

Hereford, for their part, are still in the process of recovering from their second relegation in the space of three years. In 2008, they finished 3rd in League 2 and thus gained automatic promoted to the third tier of English football for the first time in 30 years, winning 26 of their 46 league games, including an impression 15 away from home. However, after suffering a miserable season in League 1 in which they only won six games and finished bottom of the league, the Bulls were relegated back to League 2, where they continued to suffer. Having finished in lower mid table in 2009-10, United slid still further the following season, finishing 21st and only narrowly avoiding relegation after suffering a three point deduction. Last season the club fell still further and were relegated on the final day of the season, despite recording a 3-2 victory against Torquay.

	Newport County	Hereford United
10/11 Aug-12	4-3 (A) v Mansfield Town	2-1 (H) v Macclesfield Town
14-Aug-12	4-0 (H) v Nuneaton Town	2-2 (A) v Tamworth
18-Aug-12	2-1 (H) v Lincoln City	3-0 (A) v Alfreton Town
25-Aug-12	2-1 (A) v Braintree Town	4-2 (H) v Ebbsfleet United

As if often the case with teams getting relegated from a higher division, many expect Hereford to be amongst the frontrunners in the Conference Premier this season and their early season form suggests that this may well indeed be the case. After winning a tough opening fixture against the other relegated side, Macclesfield Town, they drew at Tamworth and then recorded two comfortable victories against Alfreton and Ebbsfleet. Like Newport, they have found goals easy to come by with seven different players scoring in the league already this season and Marley Watkins and Sean Canham both netting in three of the four games played so far.

Given that this is an early season top of the table encounter, a first derby between these sides since the 1980s and a game which will be played in front of a big crowd in the still new setting of Rodney Parade, it would not be a surprise if the game is a close, feisty encounter and neither side would view a point as a bad result.

Forecast

Newport County 1 Hereford United 1