On Tuesday, Celtic travel across Cheshire to face Congleton Town. Congleton are currently fifteenth, eight points and eleven places below Celtic having played the same number of games. Kick-off is 7:45pm.

Although they lost their opening home match 3-0 to Trafford, three wins in their opening five matches saw Congleton climb the league, but two wins and five losses in their last seven have seen them slide down the league. They won their last home match, beating Avro 2-1 last Tuesday, with their last loss at home a 1-0 defeat by Widnes. Their best result at home was beating Stafford 5-0, which stood as the highest home win until Nantwich beat Trafford 6-0 in mid-October. Congleton are one of only four teams not to have had a home draw this season.

With eight goals, Max McCarthy not only tops the Congleton league goal-scorers chart but is second in the overall goal-scorer’s chart, one behind Joe Duckworth. Joe’s goal on Saturday propelling him to pole position. Fourteen of their twenty-three goals this season have come in the second half, with the hour mark their most prolific with eight. Their weakest point is the last ten minutes when they have conceded eight of their twenty-three goals. On average they score two goals per game at home, 1.9 overall, while conceding 1.4 goals per game at home and 1.8 overall. With only seven conceded at home, Congleton have the league’s third best home defence. They have scored in every home match since the opening loss to Trafford, but only kept one clean sheet at home (against Stafford).

Competitively, in the last fifty years, we’ve met Congleton five times, four times in the Cheshire Senio Cup and once in the Unibond Cup. The last meeting between the two teams was in 2023 in the Cheshire Senior Cup, which Congleton won 1-0, but the other four meetings all went Celtic’s way, with Celtic’s last win in the Cheshire Senior Cup in 2021, when Charley Doyle, Marcus Dackers and Matty Jones found the back the net in a comfortable game.

In Congleton’s last match, the 2-1 home win over Avro, Congleton lined up as:
1. David Parton
2. Marco Fregpane
3. Owen Morris
4. Peter Williams
5. Josh Ryder
6. Darren Chadwick
7. Kieran Garner-Knapper
8. William Arnold
9. Max McCarthy
10. Ethan Hartshorn
11. Daniel Needham

In Celtic’s last match, the 2-2 away draw with Wythenshawe, Celtic lined up as:
1. Charlie Monks
2. Luke Partington
3. Kyle Brownhill
4. Jordan Boon
5. Jack Tinning
6. Jordan Butterworth
7. Milan Lalkovic
8. Liam Tongue
9. Joe Duckworth
10. Jack Irlam
11. Isaac Modi

Joe Duckworth’s yellow against Clitheroe tipped him into enough cautions for a suspension and with Celtic’s injury list still problematic, Jon Macken will have a selection headache.