Bradford City ever-present Meredith relishing visit of old club York (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Bradford City ever-present Meredith relishing visit of old club York

8:00am Friday 12th October 2012 in Sport By Simon Parker, Bradford City Reporter

James Meredith is the only league ever-present in the City ranks.

The left back had started all their cup games as well, until the midweek JP Trophy win at Hartlepool when Carl McHugh was given a rare nod. Even then, Meredith came on for the closing stages to ensure the League One side could find no way through.

The fact that Meredith’s name is one of the first on Phil Parkinson’s team sheet every week will come as no surprise to tomorrow’s visitors.

He appeared 144 times in his three years with York and started more games than any other outfield player in all those seasons.

The Aussie relishes the regular run-out and has no intention of letting up. He said: “Hopefully I can continue to keep that going and playing well. It’s fantastic for your confidence to be involved every game.

“I’ve got that rhythm of playing regularly and I’m hungry to do well for myself and the team.

“I just want to push myself and help us get higher into a better position in the league. Straight promotion is our aim and I want to be a big part of that.

“I’m happy with the way I’m playing but I know there’s still more to come. I can get forward more and help out creating more opportunities or even scoring.”

Meredith has shown he is willing to launch himself on overlapping runs and boost the attack. York will be well aware of his strengths but he is confident of helping City get back to winning ways after picking up just the one point from three games.

“It will be a good game and I’m really looking to impress against my old side,” he said.

“York are a good team with a good manager in Gary Mills but hopefully we can do the job like we have done more or less every home game so far.

“The team is gaining that assertiveness from working together and we’re keen to press and keep pressing. We’re finding our form nicely at home and want to maintain that.

“Port Vale was an unfortunate defeat because we pummelled them and it didn’t reflect the way we played. But the fans are more excited and louder because they can see there’s a team out there willing to push on hard and do their best.

“We’re gaining a reputation of our ground being a fortress and hopefully that can continue.”

Shipping four goals at Dagenham was out of character for a defence that had tightened up considerably after the thrashing at Rotherham. But City restored order with a JP Trophy clean sheet.

Meredith feels the back four are improving as a unit thanks to staying behind at training.

“We do a lot of extra work after training on the back four and especially our positioning,” he said.

“ I know Andrew Davies and the way he plays from being at Derby together but we all work well together. We’re all willing to put our foot in or our head. Nobody in the back four is soft.

“We do extras and whatever we need to work on, all the lads will go out and do it off their own bat for themselves.

“We want to get into that frame of mind where we’re a winning side and we go out every game thinking we can win.”