Blog: Deja vu against Swindon for Walsall boss
On that day in 2011 a goalless draw for Walsall was very much to our advantage, both in psychological and ‘real’ terms, writes blogger Mark Jones.
It kept our own decent run of form under Dean Smith - 'the Ginger Mourinho' - going whilst at the same time preventing the Robins from kick-starting their own run-in under a newly appointed manager.
We kept ourselves above Swindon, they never really recovered and went on to be relegated without too much of a fight. We built on the point and the Great Escape was very much on.
Now a different yet equally improbable escape is very much on as the Mighty Saddlers travel to the County Ground for a promotion six-pointer.
There, I have finally gone and done it, I hae used the P-word and, what’s more, I make no apologies for doing so.
Our form in 2013 has been nothing short of outstanding, results so far have been highly encouraging and, best of all, the football we have played has been brilliant to watch.
I have tried to play our prospects down for some time now, both for fear of jinxing things and because this is Walsall we are talking about,.
But, secretly, I have known there’s been a possibility since that cold Sunday afternoon up at Preston.
The stats do back us up too, the last time we were in a position to have a crack at the play-offs at this stage of the season was under Richard Money in 2008.
We had 55 points with 10 games to go then and considered ourselves contenders, why not now?
What really clinched things for me was finding myself the other night checking the Notts County versus Leyton Orient score every five minutes and then punching the air when the Os equalised. It's getting that serious folks.
Saturday will be a massive test, as will Tuesday’s visit from Tranmere, and I don’t anticipate things being quite as comfortable as they were in last week’s thoroughly enjoyable routing of Shrewsbury.
Our following at the County Ground 24 months ago was superb but from what I can remember it was unbelievably tense. Saturday will be no different.
Swindon has traditionally been a good day out, fingers crossed for one more. It’s on!