EFL League Two, Friday 13th March
A rare football league game for me came on the frightful Friday 13th as I made my way up to The Community Stadium in Colchester as Crawley Town were visiting Colchester United in a league fixture with both sides in need of points for differing reasons.
The Us began the weekend four points outside the play off places down in 12th spot which is bang in the middle of the division, only six points separated seventh placed Grimsby Town, who occupied the final play off spot in seventh, and 13th placed Fleetwood Town, so a very tight part of the league several sides, including the Us, looking to get themselves top of that pack and in the top seven.
The hosts form since the beginning of February had been inconsistent though, three wins, three losses and a draw, so some good performances mixed with some awful ones, although their last outing saw them net a 2-1 win away at Newport County, a side who like tonight's visitors are in danger of being relegated out of the football league altogether, so The Us knew they were facing similar opposition in this contest.
Crawley sat just a point above Barrow in third bottom and second bottom Newport County and the drop zone before kick off and knew if they could grab a surprise win here would pull a gap of four points ahead of the weekend fixtures, on the flip side though they knew defeat here could see them vulnerable and find themselves in that drop zone if the bottom two picked up wins later on in the weekend. (Only two points separated Crawley in 21st and bottom side Harrogate in 24th).
However, Crawley's form is alarming since the beginning of February, their last win came at the end of January where they picked up seven points from three games, but since then it's only three points from a possible twenty one, four defeats in seven games, which is relegation form sadly for them, although they picked up a decent point at home to Swindon Town last time out, could they build on that and get themselves away from the danger zone?
The visitors actually started the better but once the hosts had got up to speed it was they who had the first effort on target when a lovely move saw a cross diverted towards his own goal by defender Scott Malone who was trying to stop the cross coming in, and visiting keeper Jacob Chapman had to scramble across his goal to tip round the post, but this was pretty much the only save the Crawley keeper had to make in the entire game.
And in a first half devoid of many goal scoring chances, it was Crawley who came closest to breaking the deadlock when Malone almost turned provider down the other end, crossing for Dion Periera whose downward header was saved well by the knees of Us keeper Matt Macey, but it was no surprise that the first half ended goalless with both sides struggling somewhat in the final third.
The one bright spark from the hosts was speedy winger Kyreece Lisbie, who was causing the visitors some alarm down the flank, but even he could not provide a killer pass or touch to help the hosts get in front, the visitors were just happy to sit in and prevent the hosts from breeching their back line, the most serious of pressure they did come under came in the final quarter of the game where they faced a barrage of corners, Jaden Williams then fired over a decent chance and Will Goodwin saw a close range effort blocked too.
Goodwin then was sent clear of the visiting backline but instead of shooting at goal decided to pass across goal to try and find team mate Williams but failed to find him and the chance was gone, much to the frustration of the home support, and that frustration could have grown when Crawley saw a Ronan Darcy effort saved at the near post by Macey, and earlier in the half they saw an effort flash across goal and inches wide of the far post in a rare break up the pitch.
However, it seemed inevitable that the game would end goalless, and so it did, meaning the hosts missed the chance to close in on the play off places, whereas the point for Crawley could be very valuable indeed in their battle against the drop and they will now hope the teams around them fail to pick up points, as do The Us who could lose ground to the top seven places come the end of the weekend if the sides above them pick up points too.
Despite the goalless draw it was lovely to spend the evening watching it with my brother Marc who is over from Norway for the weekend, so this made the evening enjoyable despite the lack of goals on offer.
Full time Colchester United 0 Crawley Town 0
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