Park Avenue boss Deacey plans same again (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Bradford Park Avenue boss John Deacey plans same again

7:00pm Thursday 7th February 2013 in Sport

Bradford Park Avenue boss John Deacey intends to keep faith with the players who ended their winless streak when his side visit Gloucester City on Saturday.

Avenue won 1-0 at home against Solihull Moors last week to halt a seven-game run without a victory in Blue Square Bet North.

It was a welcome three points after a nightmare run of fixtures against the leading clubs.

And Deacey is poised to reward the players who stopped the rot by naming an unchanged line-up.

He said: “It will be the same squad and possibly the same team, barring any issues following training this week.

“If they are all fit I can’t change it because I have to be honest with the players. They have earned that with their performances.

“I couldn’t change it too much even if I wanted to because those 16 players that were on the team sheet is my squad in full!

“I don’t have any more players hidden away or suspended or coming back from injury. What you see is what we’ve got.

“I’m happy with that though. I had a very, very strong bench against Solihull and those five players will be pushing to get back into the team so, at last, we have competition for places, which is all I have asked for.”

Saturday's hosts are currently five places below Avenue, who moved back into the top ten thanks to last weekend’s narrow win. The table is so congested that Deacey’s men could go equal sixth if they follow it up with another win.

The Avenue chief said: “We have to try to build on the last result. It was important because it broke that sequence of games without a win but we need to back it up.

“After the games against the likes of Chester, Guiseley back to back and Brackley Town, plus the others, we needed to make the most of playing one of the clubs near us in the middle of the table and the same goes for this game at Gloucester.”

City are seven points behind Avenue in 16th place but the Horsfall side have played four more games.

Deacey added: “It will be a tough game at Gloucester as they had a good win over Brackley in midweek and are a decent side.

“But even though we’ve had some tough games on the bounce, the results haven’t put us too far behind and we have a decent run-in.

“We have finished with the big guns now so let’s see how many points we can take off clubs in and around us and then have a look at it a bit down the line but anything top half will have been a great season for us.”