On Saturday (kick off 3pm), Celtic are back in league action to face Nantwich Town. Nantwich are currently sixth, one place and one point above Celtic, though they have played three games fewer.
Nantwich's home form has lifted them to sixth, with seven wins from ten matches. However, their away form is nowhere near as good, with three wins, four draws and five losses. In their last five away matches, they have beaten Witton (2-1), drawn against Scarborough and Gainsborough and lost to Mickleover, and Morpeth. Their most recent match was a thumping 4-0 win over Hyde; whilst their most recent away match was a 1-1 draw at Scarborough.
Nantwich's top scorer so far this season is Joseph Malkin, with ten, though Sean Cooke is only three behind on seven. From their forty-two goals (at a rate of 1.8 goals per game), only seventeen of them have been scored away (1.4 goals per game). They have conceded thirty-two in total (1.4 per game), with nineteen conceded away (1.6 per game). They have failed to score three times on the road (from four overall) and kept two clean sheets (from five overall).
We met Nantwich three times last season. Their last league visit here was a 1-1 draw (Ross Dent equalising), but we did beat them 1-0 in the FA Trophy thanks to a Scott Bakkor penalty. The most recent meeting was a 4-2 defeat in Nantwich. In five visits, Nantwich have won once, in the Cheshire Senior Cup in 2014 (2-0). Celtic's last league win over them was the season before when we beat them 1-0 (Alex Honeyball with a late first half goal). We followed that up with a 3-2 win in Nantwich, but lost in the Cheshire Senior Cup at their place.
Nantwich's last match was the 4-0 defeat of Hyde at Nantwich. In that match they lined up as:
1. Greg Hall
2. Troy Bourne
3. Matty Devine
4. Joel Stair
5. Josh Langley
6. Luke Offord
7. James Lawrie
8. David Webb
9. Ethan Varian
10. Sean Cooke
11. Joseph Mwsaile
Neil Kengni and Jack O'Leary have both departed on loan whilst Preston North End duo Ethan Walker and Adam O'Reilly have joined on loan until the end of the season and could feature against Nantwich.
Celtic need to get past their post-Christmas slump. We have a good record against Nantwich and a win would see us leap frog them and could put us level on points with Warrington in fifth (they are at home to Whitby). Four teams are within three points of Celtic, so a loss could see us drop to eleventh, with Radcliffe (away at Bamber Bridge), Mickleover (at home to Matlock), Scarborough (away at Stafford) and Witton (away at South Shields) able to overtake us.
