Yeovil Town v Barnsley
Whilst most will focus on the clash at the top of the table there is a game almost as big at the bottom end of the table. By just looking at the Glovers twitter account you know this is a big game with their “#packthepark” campaign. Meanwhile, if Barnsley are not careful they are going to repeat the remarkable great escape of last season again this campaign.
I can only imagine how it has felt to be a Yeovil fan in the past couple of weeks. The improvement has been exponential from the Glovers, but they will be looking back at what might have been going into this big game. They led 2-1 in the crazy game at Wigan with 5 minutes to go, only to end up equalising themselves to make it 3-3. At the weekend, they led 2-0 at half time and had a penalty to score a crucial 3rd, but Ishmael Miller had his penalty saved and the Glovers conceded against 10 men late on in the game for another draw. To round off this yo-yo 7 days they looked set to record a memorable win at league leaders Leicester only to be denied in added time through a Chris Wood goal. This game is by far the easiest that Yeovil have had in recent weeks on paper, however, football as we all know is not played on paper and Gary Johnson will have his players fired up for this game.
Barnsley are building a reputation similar to that of Wigan in their Premier League years: consistently sit in the relegation zone until spring and then a sudden upturn in results and the great escape is on. After consecutive 3-0 defeats at the hands of Watford and Leicester, they were unfortunate last week to concede a last minute goal against the in form Bournemouth. This did not lower the Tykes confidence though as they pulled off one of the shocks of the season on Tuesday evening to beat Reading 3-1 at the Madejski. This game looks a certainty for both teams to score and it is set up to be an open end-to-end game. Dale Jennings has been one of Barnsley’s better performers this season and he scored a beautiful long range goal to secure the win on Tuesday. Jennings is a match winner who can take the game away from the opposition and he is this game’s key man.
Previous meeting: 1-1 draw
Match odds: Yeovil 21/20 Draw 12/5 Barnsley 13/5
Score prediction: 2-2 draw
