Bradford City's attractive home match against First Division leaders Nottingham Forest on Saturday is heading for a sell-out.

Chairman Geoffrey Richmond said: "Forest have told us they have already sold 2,000 tickets and expect to sell their 3,500 allocation.

"And we are confident of selling our home places to give us another 17,000-plus crowd for the second home match in a row. Forest are top of the league and people want to see them play."

City whose crowds are running at their highest level since the war have had three 17,000-plus crowds so far this season against Middlesbrough, Huddersfield Town and Manchester City.

Meanwhile, physiotherapist Steve Redmond is the busiest man at Valley Parade this week as City prepare for their Forest assignment.

City gained a morale boosting win at Norwich on Saturday with a depleted team, but skipper Wayne Jacobs hurt his pelvis during the match and, although the injury settled down over the weekend he is a serious doubt for the Forest match.

Jamie Lawrence and Darren Moore are both down with flu, Craig Ramage got a kick on the calf at Norwich while Shaun Murray and Robert Steiner who missed the Norwich match are still under treatment for calf injuries.

Midfielder Nigel Pepper who missed the Norwich match through suspension is still banned and 18-year-old Mark Bower who made an impressive substitute appearance at Norwich is also suspended.

In addition, John McGinlay, John Dreyer and Dennis Sepp are out of action for the rest of the season. McGinlay (Achilles) and Sepp (knee) have both had operations while John Dreyer is still recovering from a foot ligament injury.

Manager Paul Jewell and assistant Chris Hutchings saw at first hand the enormity of the task facing City when they went to see Forest hit back from 1-0 down to beat Ipswich 2-1 in a televised match at the City Ground on Sunday.

"We decided to watch the match live because TV doesn't tell you the whole picture," said Jewell. "I was impressed with both sides and, in Pierre van Hooijdonk and Kevin Campbell the have the two best strikers in the First Division with 53 goals between them."

But Jewell who received public endorsement from two of his team, Jacobs and Lawrence after the Norwich match was especially pleased with the fact that Darren Moore who had played only 78 minutes of first team football in four months played a full 90 minutes.

"Darren is nowhere near 100 per cent fit, but he will get better the more games he plays.

"He did well to go for 90 minutes," said Jewell. "It shows great character and spirit and there is plenty of that in the team. We are all pulling together and we will need to be together against Forest. It is going to be a tall order."

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