Football – England – Conference Premier
Saturday 13th September 2014 – Kickoff: 1500hrs
Hosts AFC Telford United could be in for a very bumpy ride on Saturday afternoon despite having home advantage when they entertain Conference Premier leaders Barnet at their New Bucks Head ground.
Telford currently find themselves in a real mess after just eight games into the new Conference season, being situated second from bottom of the division with just two points under their belts, thanks to draws with Southport and Welling United who also occupy positions in the lower half of the league.
But six defeats have dominated their eight matches so far and when Telford lose, they do tend to capitulate in spectacular fashion as their last two back-to-back defeats emphasise; losing 1-4 at home to Dover Athletic and their midweek defeat away at Gateshead by the same scoreline.
On home turf, Telford have a poor record of 0-1-3 6/12 and they have already conceded the highest number of goals at home in the division. Other defeats at home this season have been to Macclesfield Town and Aldershot Town, while The Bucks have failed to win in any of their last twenty (20) home matches at this level!
It’ll be interesting to see if they ‘emulate’ Hyde United’s record of a measly 10 points in a season in this term.
Visitors Barnet could hardly be further at the other end of the scale right now as they head the Conference table having won seven of their first eight matches, with just the one defeat to Lincoln City.
Since that defeat though (which was only the third match of the new season), Barnet have strung together five straight wins on the trot against Nuneaton, Dartford, Southport, Alfreton Town and Dover Athletic. More impressively, is that four of these five wins were to nil and they’ve conceded just 1 goal and scored 13 during this sequence.
The Bees’ also hold a 100% away record with stats of 4-0-0 12/0 and they look in a very good position of claiming a fifth straight away win here this afternoon (perhaps even to nil again).
Barnet possess the necessary firepower too in order to fulfil my pick for this fixture with midfielder Cook (6 goals), along with a forward line containing MacDonald (5 goals), Akinde (3 goals) and Spaniard Luisma (2 goals), while the defence have kept clean sheets in all four away matches to date. It’s difficult, therefore, to see anything but a Barnet win here and I’ll also back them to cover the -1 line too which is offered at over evens. Barnet to win perhaps 2-0 or 3-1.
Pick: Barnet AH-1 @ 2.09 Pinnacle
