Page 30 - Bath City v Swindon Supermarine - Saturday 19 December 2020 - FA Trophy 3rd Round

NEXT MATCH PREVIEW

Hungerford Town between ourselves and the Crusaders, all since 2016.
The next match here at Twerton The visitors have yet to win, with the City chalking up
Park will be on Saturday 28 three wins. The only other encounter was an FA Cup
match way back in 1974, which saw a comfortable
December when we will welcome
Hungerford Town for a fixture which 6-1 victory for City on our way to an agonizing first
round defeat at Wimbledon.
will be sandwiched between two
matches with Chippenham. MARTIN POWELL
The Crusaders have certainly been this season’s
surprise package, following a dismal previous term HUNGERFORD TOWN LOWDOWN:
and currently sit in 4th position with 22 points from 13
matches. In fact, they looked down on the rest of the GROUND: Bulpit Lane
division after their first six outings, which saw only two
points dropped. COLOURS: White & Black
There has been a dip since then and last Saturday’s
1-0 win over Hemel Hempstead was their first in five NICKNAME: The Crusaders
league matches. On Tuesday, they exited the Trophy
following a 2-0 defeat at Dorking, which followed a MANAGER: Danny Robinson
similar defeat in the Cup, going down 4-0 at Truro. 2019/20 FINISH: 22nd
But all people connected with City would be wise
to ignore the above as the Berkshire club have an
excellent record away from home in the League,
winning four of their six matches and losing just the
once.
New manager Danny Robinson has clearly worked
wonders and one of his key decisions must surely have
been to sign striker Ryan Seager from Yeovil during
the summer. A player who was given his professional
début at Southampton by current Barcelona boss
Ronald Koeman, Seager sits in second place in the
League’s charts behind Dorking’s Jason Prior, with nine Ryan Seager
goals already in the bag. This is a player that the City
defence will have to keep a very close eye on.
The last time City faced Hungerford was back in
March when we travelled to Bulpit Lane in 4th place
and heading towards the play-offs. Although only one
point had been secured in the previous matches with
Braintree and Weymouth, an Adam Mann goal was
enough to secure the three points. This left the home
team rooted very firmly at the bottom of the table with
some very tough fixtures to come. Ross Stearn puts City 2-0 ahead during the meeting with Hungerford Town here at
But as City fans who were there that afternoon will Twerton Park last season.
recall, the match was played in a surreal atmosphere
with a widespread feeling that the season was about
to be curtailed, due to the pandemic. In fact, the
attendance was boosted by fans of neighbouring clubs
who had already apparently played their last match.
As we all know, no more football was played apart
from our appearance in the play-off eliminator and
with the decision that there would be no relegation, the
Crusaders were handed a reprieve.
By coincidence, our visit to Hungerford later in the
season will come 12 months to the day since that
strange match and hopefully, fans from both clubs will
be able to enjoy it.
This will only be the 5th league match held at Twerton Bulpit Lane, Hungerford Town F.C.

30