Rushden & Diamonds v Crawley Town

Nene Park, Irthlingborough

Saturday 6^th September 2008 - 15:00

Crawley Town are the visitors to Nene Park on Saturday afternoon as the Diamonds try to end their current run of five games without a victory, following the 1-1 draw at Barrow in midweek. It will also be a chance to show that the disappointment of conceding the late equaliser in Cumbria has been used positively in the approach to this game. Details of the fixture, including ticket information, and the possible impact on match traffic of the Irthlingborough Carnival can be found here.

Crawley Town - The Club

Crawley Town were formed in 1896, adopted professional status in 1962. Prior to reaching the Conference in 2004 the club's finest moment was the FA Cup victory over NorthamptonTown in the 1991-92 season.

They are managed by Steve Evans, who was manager as Boston United when they pipped Dagenham & Redbridge (managed by Garry Hill) to the Conference title. In his squads in the past two seasons he has featured a number of ex-RDFC players, and these currently include Glenn Wilson and Jamie Cook. Their most recent game was a 2-1 win over Grays Athletic which took them to fifth in the table on 13 points. Their team for that game was : Rayner, Quinn, Wilson, Rents, Wright, Weatherstone, Forrest, Bulman, Pinault, Killeen, Cook.

Previous Meetings

The Diamonds didn't meet Crawley during the first period in the Conference, as they were still in the Southern League system, but did meet them in the two seasons in that system - in those days the Dr Martens Premier - and kept an unbeaten record. Conversely the Diamonds have failed to record a victory against the Reds since their return to the Conference.

The first meeting in the Conference was at the start of the 2006-07 season, in the Diamonds first game back in the Conference, under Paul Hart, and Crawley won 1-0 in West Sussex, and then drew 1-1 at Nene Park against Garry Hill's team in a Friday night game in March against the Diamonds team of :- Scott Tynan, Jon Ashton, Paul Watson, Chris Hope, Jason Goodliffe, Danny Williams (Lee Tomlin 68), Michael Bostwick (Gary Mills 45), Curtis Woodhouse, Marcus Kelly, Simeon Jackson, Michael Rankine (Chris Beardsley 45). The goalscorer was Lee Tomlin.

The second meeting at Nene Park in the Conference was also an evening game, which ended 1-1 after a late goal from Simeon Jackson. The team that evening was Paul Bastock, Curtis Osano, Paul Watson (Simeon Jackson 73), Chris Hope, Wayne Hatswell, Jon Challinor, Curtis Woodhouse, Andy Burgess, Michael Rankine, Martin Foster (Tom Shaw 78), Dean Howell (Lee Tomlin 58).

The most recent game was the disappointing 4-1 defeat in West Sussex, with ex-Diamond Jamie Cook netting a hat-trick.

Links

Crawley Town Official Site

Wikipedia Entry