Port Vale prepare for visit of Football League upstarts Salford City
BETTING PREVIEW: Port Vale’s next opponents have been causing waves in League Two this season. Can Port Vale break their duck against them?
A look at the odds ahead of Saturday’s game
Football League upstarts Salford City may have risen through the lower leagues quickly but promotion out of League Two is far from a formality. Port Vale are five points above the club owned by Manchester United’s Class of ‘92 with two places separating them, the pair being tenth and twelfth respectively.
Backed by a consortium of millionaires, Salford City have rubbed many clubs who are hard-up the wrong way with their money-based approach to success. The struggles of Bury and Macclesfield Town show how much of a struggle it can be on the lower rungs of the football ladder. And Salford could yet achieve a fifth promotion in six seasons if results improve. There is plenty of the season still to play and they are only eight points off the last promotion place. It will up to the likes of the Valiants to stop their rise from continuing.
The Vale should be confident coming into this encounter as their most recent outing saw them beat Exeter City3-1 at Vale Park. It was a game that featured a Richie Bennett brace as well as a Leon Legge tap in. David Amoo excelled from the right side, scaring the defence with his turn of pace and impressing with his clever passing. Like many of Port Vale’s key players, Amoo seems to perform especially well at Vale Park. Of the fifteen League Two games that they have played on their own patch, Port Vale have lost just one. Defeats are rare occurrences for the home side and this will bolster belief ahead of Saturday’s fixture. The problem is that Salford aren’t short of belief either. They can counter-boast about their away record. The fifth-best such record in the division, Salford travel to Vale Park on the back of consecutive wins on the road.
Another feather in the Salford cap is their recent 3-0 win over the Valiants in the EFL Trophy, which occurred in early January. In the League, the reverse fixture was a much closer affair that ended 1-1 at Moor Lane. Although Salford required a stoppage-time equaliser, the result was fair as the teams showed that they were evenly matched. Salford bossed possession and completed more passes, but Port Vale created more chances and completed more dribbles. Now, it’s up to the Valiants to take revenge for the heavy defeat inflicted upon them in the cup. To do so, they will need their best players to step up to the plate.
Bennett’s six goals this season are still not enough to guarantee a starting place in the forward line. However, with the likes of Amoo and David Worrall in support, at least he’s never short of supply. That creative pairing has set up a combined ten goals (with Worrall’s seven being the sixth-highest tally in the division) and also chipped in with seven goals between them. Bet365 price Amoo at 13/5 to score anytime while Betway offer odds of 13/2 for the in-form attacker to open the scoring. These are two of the many bookmakers who offer users promo codes that can be availed of with SportyTrader. Salford aren’t short of individual quality either. Ex-Aberdeen forward Adam Rooney has eight goals with a shadowing set of accomplices in Conway, Touray and Thomas-Asante. It promises to be an interesting encounter that may depend on the mercurial talents of one player to steal the points.