MATCH: Liversedge v Ramsbottom United
VENUE: Clayborn Ground, Quaker Lane, Liversedge, WF15 8DF
COMPETITION: Pre-season friendly
DATE: Tuesday 3rd August 2021
KICK-OFF: 7.45pm
DISTANCE FROM RAMMY: 35 miles, 42 minutes

TICKETS:
Buy tickets in advance on the Liversedge FC website:
https://liversedge-fc.ticketlight.co.uk/order/tickets/13358798/liversedge-afc-vs-ramsbottom-utd-liversedge-afc-2021-08-03-19-45-00

Adults £6.75, concessions £3.60, Under 16s FREE

OVERVIEW:
Two more pre-season games are left and the next one is the re-arranged trip over to West Yorkshire to play the newly joined Northern Premier League East side, Liversedge.

The near-Cleckheaton side had been members of the North East Counties League since 1982 before making the step over into the NPL East league for the first time.

And they join it in some terrific form too, having lost just three of their 31 games played in the NCEL Premier Division across the two null-and-void seasons, sitting second and third in the divisions when the plugs were pulled.

The 2020/21 season saw them unbeaten across the seven games played, scoring 25 goals and conceding just three – that is quite some record – so Tuesday night’s game will be another stiff test for Lee Donafee’s side, who are looking to bounce back from the 6-1 defeat at Cymru Premier powerhouses Bala Town on Saturday.

HISTORY:
There is just the one previous competitive meeting between the Rams and Liversedge and what a steal it was from the visitors in the preliminary round of the FA Cup in August 2017!

Jerome Wright gave the Rams a 15-minute lead which was cancelled out by Devonte Morton seven minutes before the break. Lee Gaskell’s strike on 54 minutes put the Rams back ahead and it will looking like we were heading into the ‘hat’ for the next round…. until Roy Foggarty did this:-

Snippet from the match report from the old RammyUnited website:

“Those concerns were realised as on 89 minutes the aforementioned Foggarty worked some space on the edge of the penalty box before sending a shot past Fearon and into the net for a late equaliser for Liversedge.

“As the Rams faithful were contemplating a replay in West Yorkshire on Tuesday night, things would get worse as Foggarty again found room near the Rams’ penalty area before repeating the trick and sending another shot past Fearon to win the tie in the 91st minute.”

Two goals in the space of three minutes gave the visitors a remarkable 3-2 win and ended our interest in the competition in manager Mark Fell’s inaugural cup game with the club.

TEAM NEWS:
Manager Lee Donafee knows that the result of Saturday didn’t look good – any 6-1 defeat doesn’t – and he didn’t want to make any excuses for it.

“There were no excuses from the game on Saturday, it was a good run out for us against probably the fittest side that I have ever come up against. They have been back in training since May and were knocked out of the UEFA Conference League last week, so maybe took it out on us a bit.

“We had lads missing from the Bury AFC game but I don’t want to make it sound like I am using that as a reason, we needed to get minutes into the legs of the players and have a look at a few and some things didn’t quite work out. But we were in the game at 2-1 and should have made it 2-2 but, collectively as a team, it wasn’t good enough but, as I said to them at half-time, we aren’t going to lose or win three points from this game, we are using the game to put things in place.

“And that is what we will be doing for the Liversedge game as we have just one more game after that before the league starts so there are places up for grabs and the lads know they have to work hard to fill them.

“I want us to put out a good performance against a very good Liversedge game, who have moved across to the NPL and are one of the really fancied sides too. It will be a good, strong test for us and I want the fans who travel to see what we are trying to achieve.”

There are still a number of players who haven’t signed the official papers to join the club as yet but Lee made some encouraging noises when asked by RamsbottomUnited365.

“We have got a few lads that are close to signing, some very good players who will fit right in and they will get more time over the next couple of games to prove they are the right fit for us.”

Lee is expecting the majority of the players who missed the Bala Town game to be available again, including new signing Cameron Collins and young Tom Glover once more.

Kick-off is at 7.45pm.