Marcus Braddock previews the weekend's game with Wig
With Salop unbeaten and playing their 3000th league game this weekend against recent F.A. Cup winners Wigan athletic, there is no better time to pop down to the Montgomery Waters Meadow. Marcus Braddock previews the game.
After what seems like aeons, Shrewsbury Town return to home action with a rather decent record behind them so far. Wigan Athletic provides the opposition and they're also in a good position and have had a bit more of a break than we have which means they've fallen three points behind us. Although Wigan are unbeaten in the league, it's Interesting to see that they've won in three games although two of those games were in the cup and one of the games saw them eventually win a penalty shoot-out. The one League game that they haven't won was at home against Portsmouth who managed to take a point away.
What seems quite ominous is Wigan's away form, admittedly its only two games but two that they won with clean sheets. The team that scored the most against Wigan was Aston Villa who put four past them in the League Cup, all of which came from balls played from the flanks. Most of the goals they've conceded seem to come from the wings but does that mean they're vulnerable or does it suggest that they have a strong central core that you can only go around. Given that we play with wingers, we could make some progress from those areas.
Defensively, if you're going to dwell upon the ball in front of your own goal, they will certainly look to punish you but even if you don't, they've got players more than capable of scoring without the opposition helping. So it's our most difficult test so far but that shouldn't faze us, we've seen bigger and better teams here over the last decade and we gave no quarter to them, hopefully we can do the same to Wigan.
The Manager
Paul Cook.
Age: 50.
Games in charge: 7. Wins: 4. Defeats: 1. Draws: 2.
Previous clubs Managed - Portsmouth (107 games, 52 wins). Chesterfield (games 145, wins 65). Accrington (33 games, 8 wins). Sligo Rovers (203 games, 95 wins), Southport (28, wins 5).
Top Scorers
Nick Powell 3
Michael Jacobs 2
Ivan Toney 2
Assists
Lee Evans 2
Ivan Tony 2
Red Cards
2, Cheyenne Dunkley vs. Portsmouth August 26th and Callum Elder vs. Milton Keynes August 5th.
Referee: Mark Heywood from Cheshire. Games this season: 4. Average yellow cards 2.5 per game. Average red cards per game: 0.25.
Assistants: Michael Denton and Mark Griffiths
Fourth Official: Abbas Khan
Team News
Town
Bryn Morris is on the road to recovery but is still a few weeks away from match fitness. Joe Riley is approaching match fitness and may appear from the bench.
Wigan
Goalkeeper Christian Walton is out with a broken leg. Cheyenne Dunkley is suspended after his sending off against Portsmouth. Defender Craig Morgan is missing long term because of a hip injury and midfielder Shaun MacDonald is still recovering from a broken leg he sustained last season.
Prediction
This is going to be a tough game against a team who were playing Premier League football not so long ago. Odd really because I remember them being a much smaller team from what is traditionally Rugby town. These days it's little old Shrewsbury against the bigger club which is fine, I’m used to that, if I needed reflected adulation I would have supported Barcelona. I'm quite happy for us to be the underrated underdogs flying under the radar. I think there is something for us in this game, a draw would be a point which would keep us up in an elevated position and even a defeat would see us still in the top ten. But I don't want to think about defeat, Wigan have a few defenders missing and I hear winger Nathan Byrne is playing in a less advanced role than his current one but then we have a similar situation with Junior Brown who is doing a great job.
Shrewsbury Town 2-2 Wigan Athletic
COYB!!!
There's no better time to see us in action than now, if you're going to go to just one game this season, this could be a good one. The lads have done us all proud and they deserve our support against a sold out away end. I hope to see you there!
Marcus