This Saturday the Saddlers travel to Crawley hoping to make it three wins on the trot and grab our seventh clean sheet of the season.
Make no mistake though Crawley are playing well and have already beat us this season, this will be our sternest test of the past few weeks.
TEAM NEWS
CRAWLEY
Joe McNerney and Ashley Nadesan are out with an ankle injury sustained three weeks ago against Portsmouth but Panutche Camara, who missed the trip to Northampton, is expected to have recovered from a knock to take his place in the squad.
WALSALL
Walsall boss Darrell Clarke confirmed this week that Elijah Adebayo, Caolan Lavery, Cameron Pring and Shay Facey are all on the treatment table. Whether any of them return for the weekend remains to be seen.
LIKELY LINE UPS?
Crawley – Morris, Young, Tunnicliffe, Dallison-Lisbon, Doherty, Francomb, Ferguson, Grego-Cox, Enigbokan-Bloomfield, Lubala, Palmer
Walsall – Roberts, Liddle, Clarke, Scarr, Jules, Kinsella, Sinclair, Guthrie, Holden, Gaffney, Gordon
ONES TO WATCH
BEZ LUBALA
Lubala has scored seven goals already this season – more than Walsall combined!
He left Birmingham City during the summer as was soon snapped up by his former Birmingham coach Gabriele Cioffi.
RORY GAFFNEY
Rory Gaffney is yet to find the target since his loan move from Salford but the former Bristol Rovers striker has proved a handful for defences.
His best game in a Saddlers shirt came last Tuesday night where it was his initial shot that led to Stuart Sinclair’s goal against Morecambe.
PAST MEETINGS
The Saddlers and Crawley have faced each other on just seven occasions Walsall 1, Draw 3, Crawley 3
The last time the Saddlers travelled to Crawley we lost 1-0 as Conor Henderson scored in the last minute.
The Saddlers lost 3-2 to Crawley in the Carabao Cup this season.
Three matches at Crawley
21.10.14 – Crawley 1-0 Walsall
23.11.13 – Crawley 0-0 Walsall
17.11.12 – Crawley 2-2 Walsall
MATCH OFFICIALS
The match officials have been announced for this Saturday’s game and are as follows –
REFEREE – SAM PURKISS
ASSISTANTS – Paul Yates and Leigh Crowhurst
FOURTH OFFICIAL – Oliver Jackson
Sam Purkiss is another official who is in his debut season in the Football League.
He officiated in the National League last season.
So far this season he has officiated six games this season, dishing out twenty-four yellow cards and no reds.
VITAL PREDICTION
Crawley 0-1 WALSALL
We seem to have found the perfect defence – its whether we can grab a goal at the other end.
A third successive victory will start to see us looking upwards rather than downwards.
Danny Guthrie scoring for us.
UP NEXT
Tuesday 1st October
EFL Trophy
WALSALL v Southampton Youth
