2013 Prediction League; Game 26 v Newport County (home)

Div3North · 09-01-2014, 19:58

Accrington Stanley

V

Newport County

2013/14 Prediction League – Game 26; v Newport County (home)

So now that’s three things we owe Newport a good smacking for …………(1) the 4-1 defeat in the first game of the season

………..(2) the 6 points they’ve conceded to Northampton Town in the league ……………

(3) the fact that they’ve (today) signed The Big Beast (Rene Howe), who has been known to give us a few headaches in the past.

They haven’t done much in the markets since the summer; they signed Brighton striker George Barker (22) on loan for a month, but when that ended he signed for Swindon on an 18 month contract; they’ve also loan-signed 20 year-old Cardiff defender Adedeji Oshilasa; they signed ex Cheltenham defender Billy Jones (26); and – today – they added Rene Howe (27) – at various times the star striker of Posh (including loans at Rochdale, Morecambe and Gillingham), Torquay and Burton Albion

…………………… Big Beast Howe may well be cover (or replacement

) for last season’s leading scorer Aaron O’Connor (30), who’s been out all season injured and who has – today – hacked off manager Justin Edinburgh by posting criticism of the club’s “training methods” on a social media site (twitter, I presume), claiming that injured players were being forced to “be in” (= “go to work”) 8 hours a day

· "Lose a couple games and now all of a sudden the injured lads have to be in for 8 hours a day #CosThatsGonnaHelp #Shambles."

– a claim which JE denies, saying of O’Connor:

· "I'm disappointed. I've made Aaron aware that I'm going to be seeing him. It will be dealt with and dealt with in the correct manner. I feel that the players are treated correctly here," he said. "They are treated as adults but I feel that he has overstepped the mark.”

Oooops ………………bad timing or what?

Newport lie 8th in League 2; P23 (two postponements) W10 D7 L6 F31 A24 Pts 37; 13 of those 23 have been away from home, and their record is bizarre in the extreme ……….They’ve lost 4 away, but three of them by 4-1 (at Fleetwood), 3-1 (at Northampton) and 3-0 (at Rochdale)

……….they’ve drawn six times

– 1-1 at Scunthorpe and at the Daggers, and 0-0 at Bury, Plymouth, Cheltenham and Oxford ….and they’ve won three – 1-0 at Wycombe, 2-0 at Exeter and 2-0 at Pompey; 7 clean sheets in 13 away games

; they’ve scored two twice, once five times, and not at all six times

; GF 10, GA 13 (conceding four once, three twice and one three times, as well as the 7 clean sheets) ……….if anyone can see any kind of pattern in that, I’m impressed; bookies have them 7-5, us 9-5 and the draw 12-5 …….if this hasn’t got 0-0 written all over it, I don’t know what has!

They’re out of the Cups; in the Capon (League Cup) they won 3-1 at Brighton before losing 3-0 at the Baggies

; the Paintpot saw them evict Crawley 3-2 away and Pompey 3-0 at home, before meeting a sticky end in the Southern Semis, 3-0 at Peterborough

; and the “Proper” (FA) Cup had them struggle past Braintree

of the Conference 1-0 at home after a 1-1 draw away, and then not struggle past Kidderminster

of the Conference in Round Two, losing 4-2 away. 44 goals in all competitions in 31 games; leading scorers are – for once – all strikers; 27 year-old ex Plymouth, Millwall, Wycombe, Torquay, Brizzle Rovers and Cheltenham front man Chris Zebroski (who doesn’t stay anywhere very long, it seems) has 7, as has Conor Washington (21), signed from St Ives Town, for whom he scored 52 in 50 games; Danny Crow (also 27 – JE must like 27 year-old strikers!) – once of Norwich, Posh, Cambridge and Luton – has 5.

Our “head-to-head” needs some work on it …………..P1 L1 F1 A4 Pts0 ….Hmmmm! Pants!

Deadline for entries is, as always, scheduled kick-off time, which is 3.00pm on Saturday 11th January 2014. Logically, this might be a good game to win, for all sorts of reasons – most of which finish with the words “three points”; and we will; won’t we?

Good luck to everyone …….…… Remember; passion overcomes logic…........…. Keep the Faith ….……..And thanks for playing!