Gateshead vs AFC Fylde Preview
Gateshead will host AFC Fylde on Saturday and they will be a team running on confidence following their 3-0 win over Maidstone United on Tuesday in the FA Trophy third round.
Fylde travel to the Gateshead International Stadium in pretty good form themselves. They have lost just once in nine games, and the run has seen a 6-0 demolition of Macclesfield Town.
After three games against Maidstone in under two weeks, Gateshead manager Steve Watson said his players are feeling the effects:
“The players after the three Maidstone games are feeling a bit leggy, so we have had to taper training a little bit this week but hopefully everybody will be ready to fire again on Saturday.”
Also, during this week’s press conference, Watson was full of praise for Saturday’s opponents:
“Fylde are a very good side, they have scored a lot of goals and they had that tremendous result against Macclesfield and they followed that up with another good result.
"They’ve got good firepower and they’re an attack minded side but we are a side that are defending well and not conceding many goals.”
Saturday’s fixture has all the ingredients needed to be an entertaining clash. Both teams are on unbeaten runs, scoring goals for fun and they both need points to gain ground on the play-off pack.
In terms of a prediction, I am going for a 2-1 win for Gateshead.
The Heed are in good form at home and have been solid defensively of late.
Fylde are much stronger at home than they are on the road, they have lost five out of their last seven away games coming into Saturday’s meeting.
And for that reason, I think Gateshead will edge it.
Credit to Maidstone for the video linked in this article.