Right there's two ways of looking forward to this game.
You can try and win the Super Fan prize. I think without question,
everything that could be said about this unique competition has been
said. There'll be a few of you who at this stage feel that you have a
genuine of winning the Super Fan status. If you're one of them, then you
don't need me to tell you that time is running out.
It promises to be a very close run thing, and suggestions seem to be
that the winning supporter will have encouraged somewhere between twenty
and thirty supporters to attend the Chesterfield game, based on
messageboard figures. The actual winning figure could be higher or lower
than this, but every one of those who have promised to attend will need
to show, so keep on at them, keep encouraging them, and you never
know.....
But if you don't fancy your chances of scooping the Super Fan status,
then please do not feel that your efforts will be wasted. Whilst one
supporter will consider himself to be the winner, deep down the winner
will be the club. For years, we have lamented how despite relatively
decent fortunes on the pitch, we have struggled to significantly boost
attendances. This is our opportunity to do something about it.
It would be wrong for us to launch this match preview without casting
a thought towards Gary Jones. For this Saturday, Jonah will equal Graham
Smith's club appearance record when he leads Dale out against the
Spireites.
In this era where some players stick with the same club from transfer
window to transfer window, it is testament to Jonah that he has chalked
up so many appearances for Dale, and with time on his side, he has it
well within himself to go on and set such an appearance record for the
club, that we may never see it bettered in our lifetimes.
Jonah has pretty much been part of the fixtures over the past ten
years since he made his debut away at Peterborough with very few people
knowing anything about him at the time. There's been plenty of
highlights along the way, and you'll be hard pushed to find anyone who
has worked with him at the club throughout that time who not got the
utmost respect for him.
One can only hope that equalling the appearance record of the only
Dale captain to lead us to promotion is not the only achievement he will
share with him. A crowd of 5,000 plus to applaud him onto the pitch
would be a worthy tribute.
Anyway, time to talk nonsense.
We're in real danger of blowing this home form problem into something
much bigger than actually is. No one is doubting that results haven't
been good enough at home, but you get the feeling from talking to some
supporters that the home form has written off our season already.
As I said, I'm under no illusions that it could be better, and I'm
certainly not giving it the old "we should just be happy to be here in
League Two" line. But we stand in a fantastic position at the moment,
with the season very much alive.
Hopes were high in pre-season, and it has been argued many times that
expectations were unrealistic - something I don't necessarily believe.
But no matter how optimistic you were back in August, if someone had
said to you that we'd be missing a defence for the first three months of
the season, we'd have last year's top scorer ruled out for the season
after just six appearances and we'd have sold this year's top scorer in
January after receiving an offer we couldn't refuse, then I'd imagine
you have started thinking towards the 2008-9 season.
As it stands, despite all of that, we're on the verge of being where
we want to be, with the comfort blanket of games in hand. Based on
averages from previous seasons, we'll need something like twenty one
points from our remaining fifteen matches if we are to make the play
offs this season. (click
here to work out where those twenty one points can come from)
There's plenty of teams at the bottom needing more points per game than
that just to remain in the Football League.
But despite the position of what should be relative optimism, there's
a whiff of pessimism in the air. Hopefully, the increased crowd at
Spotland this Saturday will help to counter that against an out of form
Chesterfield side, and we can leap frog them sneaking our way into the
top seven for only the second time this season.
And one final thought for this game. Throughout the season, we have
cast an eye over at events at Gigg Lane, and wondered whether that club
could ever get any more of a laughing stock. Can we thank our friends at
Bury FC for proving us wrong over and over?
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