By Aston
March 5 2010

Town travel to Bloomfield Road tomorrow to take on Ian Holloway’s Blackpool side, looking for a hat-trick of wins over the Seasiders this season. Town have doubts over the fitness of Gareth McAuley and David Healy, and of curse Luca Civelli is missing but other wise Roy Keane has a full squad to pick from.

Town manager Roy Keane: "I know we won at home but Blackpool had some good chances to have gone ahead early in the game, In the cup game, they finished with nine men but even then they played well and I felt we were hanging on to our 2-1 lead at the end in some respects and that should never have happened.

"This is a new game and although we will go into it with confidence, the fact that we have won our two matches against them is not an advantage. It's new challenge.

"Ian is a good manager and deserves a lot of credit for what he has achieved there this season, he's got a group of players together who perhaps were not wanted at clubs or were out of contract and they have gelled.

"That happens sometimes in football and I'm pleased for Ian and pleased for Blackpool.

"Gareth was struggling a bit with the injury but he has benefited from the week's rest and he should be okay. It was a precaution with him as much as anything, we will have to gauge how David Healy is after playing for Ireland in midweek. It was a heavy pitch by all accounts in Albania but the positive is that he got another game under his belt."

Former Town winger Billy Clarke could be back from injury, Hameur Bouazza is a doubt.

Blackpool manager Ian Holloway: "I think almost five of the top spots are chosen at the moment I would say, if I'm being totally honest, the sixth place at the moment, with what happened to Cardiff last year, could have an awful lot of teams fighting for it. Whoever has the best run-in could gallop on and get that.

"You've got to be consistent, that's been our problem. Are we consistently good enough home and away to get a run of results that manage to get us out of a division? We've done it before with eight in a row and then two in the play-offs, so are we at that stage yet? We'll soon find out.

"I'm really looking forward to it. I've thoroughly enjoyed the season and I think the lads owe it to themselves and everybody at the club to have as good a go as they can.

"Whatever they've done before isn't really a measure of what's going to happen, they've already beaten us on our turf and I don't like that," the manager said.

"Barnsley nullified us more than other teams have last week so I can't just say that my team played poorly because the work they did to try and stop us was very effective. I've got to make sure that Roy Keane doesn't do that."

Got a prediction for the game? Leave it below.

Preview: Blackpool –Town

Discussion started by Singing The Blues (IP Logged), 05/03/2010 17:56

Singing The Blues
05/03/2010 17:56

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