This Tuesday sees a visit to Valley Parade for League One’s whipping boys Colchester as they look to take away a valuable result in their bid to avoid relegation to League Two next season. The team from Essex come to Midland Road, having won only five games all season, to take on a resurgent Bradford City side who have won four of their last six games and sit just a point outside of the play-off positions.
After another win away at Blackpool last time out, the Bantams are looking to take another three points on Tuesday night as struggling Colchester come to town. Despite the best efforts of former Bantam Mark Yeates on Saturday afternoon who saw his first half effort tipped onto the crossbar by ‘keeper Ben Williams, the Bantams battled to another win in the league, running out 1-0 winners in Blackpool. Winning four of our last six League One encounters it’s safe to say that right now we’re one of the form teams in the division. The performance on Saturday was fantastic. On a very rough pitch the team battled for ninety minutes and were rewarded through a great strike from winger Kyel Reid, converting a chance created by a mazy run from captain Stephen Darby who took on three Blackpool defenders before finding Reid for his second league goal of the season.
Our match against Blackpool however took its toll in terms of injuries in the squad. Steven Davies left Bloomfield Road with a brace on his right knee with Parkinson admitting that “it’s a blow for Steve Davies. He was unfortunate not to start and we hope it’s not too serious but it doesn’t look good at this moment” whilst centre back Reece Burke twisted his ankle during the match and is a doubt for the match on Tuesday against Colchester as too is Wes Thomas who is suffering with a tight calf.
As for our opponents, the Essex outfit have only won five times all season during their league campaign, one of which came against us back in late September as they ran out comfortable 2-0 winners although Colchester have only won once since. After this weekend’s draw with fellow strugglers Shrewsbury, Colchester have set a club record of 19 games without recording a victory and have conceded a whopping 78 goals in the league already this season, an average of 2.3 per game. In contrast to that this is Ben Williams best ever year for clean sheets amassing 18 so far this term. His 2015-2016 goal per game average stands at 0.86 a game and for me he has been our most improved player from last season easily.
With a full schedule of League One matches playing out on Tuesday night another win could see the Bantams move into sixth place at the expense of Coventry who face a difficult trip to a resurgent Barnsley side whilst fifth placed side Millwall battle it out with in-form Wigan at The Den.
On Tuesday night Tom & Dom's Bradford City Special show on BBC Radio Leeds will be live from Valley Parade, 6-7pm. Guests include Bradford City midfielder Paul Anderson. Find out more here.