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Town Waiting on Four Ahead of Norwich Showdown
Town Waiting on Four Ahead of Norwich Showdown
Friday, 17th Apr 2009 15:01

Town will assess the fitness of Gareth McAuley, Kevin Lisbie, Jon Walters and Danny Haynes on Saturday ahead of Sunday's East Anglian derby at home to Norwich City (KO 12.45pm). The Blues are definitely without right-backs David Wright and Moritz Volz.

Magilton says he will give the four doubts players every chance of making it: "Gareth is going to be a late call. He'll train tomorrow, as will Kevin Lisbie, and Jon Walters will have a little run out as well.

"David Wright will be out for the remaining games, while Moritz Volz has had another injection, so I don't expect to see him again this season.

"Danny Haynes walked off the field today with a little niggle in his back, but he most certainly comes into my plans.”

McAuley is still suffering with his hamstring problem, Lisbie with a dead leg, Walters his ongoing ankle injury, Wright his hamstring and Volz his groin.

Better news on the injury front is that Jon Stead is OK after a back problem, while Tommy Smith is making progress having broken his ankle in August, something which pleases the Town boss: "Tommy Smith played in the reserves the other day and trained today and is making great progress, which we're chuffed about.”

Magilton says the Blues could look to organise a behind-closed-doors reserves game at Portman Road to help the defender continue his progress.

The Town manager says the Blues' other long-term injury victim Luciano Civelli is also doing well, but still faces being out until early 2010: "Luca has been reviewed by a specialist, who is over the moon with his progress. I think we'll let him go home for a few weeks because he's worked so hard to go and see him family.”

The Blues' starting line-up will be very much dictated by which of the injury concerns make it, but Richard Wright is a certain starter in goal with Ben Thatcher at left-back and Alex Bruce on the right.

McAuley will come back at the centre of the defence if fit, alongside Pim Balkestein, with Iván Campo deputising for the Town skipper if he misses out.

In midfield, Giovani Dos Santos, who scored against Norwich in a friendly while playing for Spurs in pre-season, could come in on the right with Jon Walters probably on the bench even if he is considered fit enough to make the 16.

Veliche Shumulikoski had a better game at Bristol City on Monday and should keep his place in the side, with David Norris probably on the left and Alan Quinn taking up the other central role.

Jon Stead could return up front, probably alongside Pablo Couñago, who has been more effective than Kevin Lisbie at home this season.


Magilton, whose side trained on the Portman Road pitch on Friday, feels a greater degree of patience is required when the Blues are at home: "You find that we become a little bit frustrated if we don't get enough passes off early doors.

"We've been able to control the tempo of games better away from home and have more possession. At home, because we were scoring freely last season, we tend to think we're going to think we're going to score with every attack.

"Patience is always a key, but while playing aggressive football, of course. That's part and parcel of the game and you have to have players who can adapt to that.”

Norwich boss Bryan Gunn says his side have no new injuries ahead of the game: "We're good, we've got the full allocation of players out on the training pitch today. Whatever bumps and bruises we had are all cleared up now. Obviously with a big game at the weekend, we wouldn't expect any different.

"They'll all be wanting to be on the training pitch to improve their fitness, apart from the long-termers - Dejan Stefanovic, Wes Hoolahan and Carl Cort - they're the only ones who will be missing out on the training pitch today."

Gunn says this week's victory over Watford has given his side confidence: "Monday started the creation of a great atmosphere, after the game in the dressing room we said 'play like that and we won't have any worries'.

"Now we've got to match those standards again and take those into a derby atmosphere and stand up to the away crowd - we want to come through that and come out on top as we did on Monday against Watford.

"Derby games have a great atmosphere, you want to play in stadiums with capacity crowds. We'll hopefully enjoy the experience, I'm certainly looking forward to the atmosphere - 12.45pm kick-off, I don't think it'll be dampened by anything. I think it'll be noisy and ferocious."

Alan Lee is the highest profile of a number of players and coaches facing clubs they have previously spent time with on Sunday. The former Town striker is on loan at Carrow Road at present and hopes to make his move from Crystal Palace a permanent one in the summer.

Current Blues David Wright and Kevin Lisbie both spent time on loan at Carrow Road prior to joining Town, while Alex Bruce was born in Norwich during his father's time as a player with the Canaries.

Specialist skills coach Steve Foley and goalkeeper-coach James Hollman both had spells with the Canaries before moving to the Blues.

Ian Crook, first team coach with Norwich, joined Town on a free transfer in the summer of 1996, but after Mike Walker returned to Carrow Road made an immediate move back up the A140, the Blues receiving around £100,000 in compensation for the midfielder's brief stay.

Norwich midfielder Robert Eagle was a schoolboy with Town before being released, but is set to leave Carrow Road this summer having not featured for the Canaries this season.

The Canaries currently sit fifth from bottom on 46 points ahead of Barnsley and Nottingham Forest on goal difference. If both pick up a point on Saturday, Norwich will go into the game in the bottom three.

Norwich's away record of won three, drawn five and lost 13 looks even less impressive than 11th-placed Town's home form of won six, drawn nine and lost six.

Historically, Town have much the better record in East Anglian derbies, winning 39 (37 in the league), losing 34 (28) and drawing 17 (14).

Last season the Blues defeated the Canaries 2-1 at Portman Road with Danny Haynes scoring his usual winner after Canary loanees Ched Evans and Alex Pearce had hit the net, the latter at the wrong end.

Earlier this season, Town's poorest away performance of the season saw the Canaries win 2-0 at Carrow Road via goals from Lee Croft and Matthew Pattison.

Section 6 have plans for a pre-match meet-up, march the ground and confetti display, which you can read more about here.

Fans from various overseas branches including Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Northern Ireland will be at the game. On Saturday an ITFC Sweden side, with TWTD's Phil guesting, will take on Punch Drunk FC in a friendly at Gainsborough Sports Centre (KO 11am).

TWTD issue 97 will be on sale for the first time at Sunday's game. Jon Walters is this issue's interview star and talks about the disappointing season but also says that much groundwork has been done which will benefit the club in the future.

Elsewhere, Gavin Barber outlines the likely shape of this summer's speculation, Roger Hermiston assesses some of the press coverage the Blues have been getting this season and Frank Weston puts Jim Magilton on trial, as well as much, much more.

The fanzine will be on sale from our sellers around the ground (by Sir Alf, next to the Portman Road entrance to the Greene King Stand, by Planet Blue) from 11am.

If you're not at the game, you can buy a single copy or six-issue subscription here. Subscriptions can also be obtained for free via the same URL if you sign up to one of our affiliates.

Although there is no live TV coverage of the match, Five Live Extra are broadcasting commentary.

Sunday's referee will be Neil Swarbrick from Lancashire, who has shown 73 yellow cards and four reds in 32 games so far this season. Swarbrick's last Town match was the 3-1 defeat at Charlton last season, in which he showed Addicks defender Jon Fortune a red card after the final whistle for punching then-Blues striker Alan Lee.

Probable squad: R Wright, Bialkowski, Bruce, Peters, Thatcher, McAuley, Balkestein, Campo, Shumulikoski, Quinn, Norris, Dos Santos, Garvan, Miller, Walters, Haynes, Stead, Couñago, Lisbie, Wickham.


Photo: Action Images



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