Walsall Team News
On loan duo Joe Murphy and Eric Skora will return to the side. Murphy will replace Rene Gilmartin who kept his first clean sheet for the club in the 2-0 win over Yeovil at the weekend. Daniel Fox will drop back to left back and Julian Bennett is expected to move to centre back in the place of Steve Staunton who limped off against Yeovil. Eric Skora will replace Fox in midfield. Recent signing James Constable is added to the squad after serving a one match ban for the 5 yellow cards he collected while playing for Chippenham Town. Otherwise there is nothing new to report on. Merson and Oakes will be out for around 3 weeks. Standing, Wright and Wrack are still absentees with Wrack of course out for the season.
Oldham Team News
Oldham will have to make one change from the team that drew with Brentford on Saturday. Will Haining lasted only 7 minutes of that game and it is likely he will be out for around 6 weeks as he suffered a hamstring injury. It was the first game on the comeback trail for Haining who was recovering from a previous injury. Moore has a few options on who will replace him but it looks like Rob Scott will be called upon. Paul Edwards returns from suspension and he rejoins the squad, competing with Marc Tierney for a starting spot.
Last Season
Last season this fixture would have been a terrific game for a neutral or indeed a Oldham fan. For a Walsall fan it was simply awful. We took a 2-0 lead and Daryll Taylor scored from an acute angle resulting from a short corner by Paul Merson. At this point it looked we were well on our way to three points and looking like we were going to maintain our unbeaten start to the season. Then a comedy of errors from keeper Richard McKinney ensured we left pointless losing 5-3. 41 year old David Eyres scored two as Oldham took advantage of McKinneys rapidly deflating confidence as he was being barracked by the Walsall fans behind him for his shockeing performance. Not surprising that was the last we saw of him in a Walsall first team shirt. McKinney is now playing in the Conference and is only a number in the succession of keepers who have tried to replace Super Jim.
Predictions
Walsall need to start picking up points away from home and tonight will be tough against a Oldham side building up a unbeaten run. I think there is enough to suggest from our recent performance that will will cause Oldham problems and i am going for a 2-1 Walsall win