After back-to-back Saturdays with no competitive football, Enfield Town go into the lion’s den – or make that the Urchins den – tomorrow in what promises to be one of our toughest encounters of the season.
Three points clear at the top and unbeaten at home may look scary but don’t tell Gavin Macpherson we have nothing to lose against the league leaders.
“I never like to use that phrase no matter who we are playing, it’s not in my vocabulary,” said Gavin. “Some people have said it’s a free hit but that’s nonsense. We understand how vast the task is but we’ve been on decent form of late so why not face the leaders in their own backyard and have a go at it? If they are too good for us, so be it.”
Yet as if facing Hornchurch wasn’t in itself a daunting enough challenge, Town will have to shuffle the pack in defence against a team that has been scoring for fun.
Not only will Xav Benjamin have to serve the one-match ban that would have been against Hampton and Richmond but the classy Joe Kizzi, who played a major part in our recent mini-revival, has been recalled by Barnet through injury.
With Henry Hawkins available but still regaining fitness after a lengthy layoff, Gavin faces an unenviable decision with the back line once again having to be tinkered with. The fact we have no fewer than six games in three weeks cannot be discounted.
“Henry is injury free but we’ll have to assess him,” said Gav. “I don’t want to focus too much on those we haven’t got because in other areas of the pitch some important players are back and good to go like Youngy, Tosh and Lemar.”
And between the sticks we have another new goalkeeper making his Town debut.
Having had two keepers on loan in recent weeks following the departure of Rhys Forster, both are now injured and have now been recalled by their respective clubs.
That forced the management team to act quickly by bringing in Hubert Graczyk following his departure from Wealdstone.
Poland-born Hubert was an England youth international between U16 and U18 levels and spent much of his youth career with Arsenal’s Academy after joining from Everton and featured 31 times for the Gunners’ U21 side.
This time, the deal is not a loan and it is hoped that after all the unavoidable chopping and changing Hubert, 22, can at least play out this season with Town.
Although Tuesday’s friendly with Arsenal provided vital minutes on the pitch, Gavin wasn’t 100 percent comfortable with some players’ level of performance.
“It remains to be seen until we’re into the game Saturday how much the rest and the Arsenal friendly did us good, or didn’t,” said Gav. “We’ve had a couple of curveballs this week but we’ve set a points target until the end of the year, let’s see if we can get there.”
AW