[Bispham Seasider]

A thread about the Reserves (the Ressies)!

Blackpool FC Reserves compete in the Pontins Holidays League Division One West.

Teams in Division One West for the 2007-08 season are (with the league the first team play in for the current season in brackets):

Accrington Stanley (League Two)
Blackpool (The Championship)
Burnley (The Championship)
Bury (League Two)
Carlisle United (League One)
Chester City (League Two)
Manchester City (The Premiership) (*)
Morecambe (League Two)
Preston North End (The Championship)
Rochdale (League Two)
Tranmere Rovers (League One)
Wrexham (League Two)

(*) Manchester City is their Academy team, not their reserve team who play in the Premier League Reserves.

Blackpool Reserves do not play their home games at Bloomfield Road. Starting with the 2006-07 season they now play home games at local non-league club, Fleetwood Town Highbury Avenue stadium.

Blackpool ended 2007 on 18th December with a 2-0 away win over Wrexham held at Buckely Towns ground. Attendance: 59

The Blackpool team for the game was:

Rhys Evans (*)
Scott Metcalfe
Danny Coid (*)
Matt Lawlor
Ashton Bayliss
Marcus Bean (*)
Adrian Forbes (*)
Scott Vernon (*)
Phil Marsh
Matty Kay
John Hills (*)

Subs:
Kyle Clancy
Stefan Laird
Ross Lloyd
Danny Mitcheley
Dominic Merella

Players marked (*) are First Team squad players who usually get only on the bench or just the 17 for first team matches. The rest are made up of Youth team and Reserve team players.

Youth team striker, Danny Mitchely, only came on in the 77th minute when the game was 0-0. He scored in the 82nd minute and three minutes later won a penalty which he got up and scored.

Blackpool are currently in 2nd place in the league table, right behind PKE.

PKE 23 points from 12 games
Blackpool 18 points from 10 games (won 5 drawn 3 lost 2) Goal for: 22 Goals against: 12

The Ressies next scheduled match is a home match against Burnley on Wednesday 9th January at 7.00pm.

[Bispham Seasider]

Tonight the Reserves are playing (right now) Preston North End reserves at home (at Fleetwood Towns Highbury Avenue ground).

Blackpool are currently in second place in the Division One West league with 18 points from 10 games, 5 points behind PKE who have played two more games.

Blackpool put out a strong line-up:

Gerrard (*)
Coid (*)
Eastham
Bayliss
Tierney (**)
Wiles (**)
Southern (*)
Bean (*)
Hills (*)
Marsh
Parker (*)

Subs:
Kay
Halstead
Merella
Mitchley
Metcalfe

(*) First team squad players
(**) Two players who have recently come back from loans at other clubs


Oh and in the scum team was expected to be former 'Pool favourite Brett Ormerod.

[Bispham Seasider]

From the match report -

"Brett Ormerod, John Hills and Danny Coid on the same pitch.
If you closed your eyes it felt like the Millennium Stadium, May 2001, when all three combined to devastating effect and seal a famous Blackpool play-off victory over Leyton Orient.

Actually, that last statement is not quite true. No matter how much you closed your eyes it didn't feel like that glorious day in Cardiff.

For starters it's a damn sight colder in late January than it is in May, and another difference is that the crowd gathered at Fleetwood's Highbury Avenue last night wasn't 50,000.

It was 237 and that included a border collie which had sneaked its way in (without paying I might add) and spent the majority of the 90 minutes relieving itself on a wooden panel at the far end of the ground.

The dog missed most of the action, which is a pity because the footballing fare on offer was, if not quite of Millennium Stadium vintage, still fairly entertaining."

Apparently Keigan Parker played well as did other players on the fringe of the first team squad and with there being a number of scouts from other clubs maybe one or two players still might leave before the midnight deadline tonight.

[Dynamogal]

No picture of the dog???

[Bispham Seasider]

unfortunately not!

[Bispham Seasider]

The Ressies were in action this evening and apparently won 4-2 at Tranmere Rovers with the 'Pool goals coming from an OG, Andt Welsh, Danny Mitchley (yet again! He has been a "goal machine" for the Youth team and when played the Ressies this season. And he had only been on the pitch for 5 minutes as a sub when he scored tonight!) and the 4th goal from Ashton Bayliss.

So back to winning ways after recently losing the last two matches at home to PKE and away at Accrington.

[Bispham Seasider]

The Ressies kick-off the new season on Wednesday 20th August at home to Manchester City.

The match is at Highbury Avenue, Fleetwood, the home of Fleetwood Town and both Blackpool and Fleetwood Town season ticket holders can go to the match for free on production of their season tickets.

Kick-off is 2pm according to the Fleetwood Town official site, though I'm sure it was supposed to be 7pm. Highbury Avenue now has another two new stands - a new 650 seater West Stand and a 2,000 terraced North Stand to add to the Percy Ronson stand at the south end of the ground which is terraced and holds about 1,300. They have plans for a 2,000 seater stand at the east of the ground too. It is starting to look like a tidy little stadium.

[Dynamogal]

Wednesday at 2PM? Not very fan friendly!

[Bispham Seasider]

Indeed not! Usually the games are a 7pm kick-off with some games at 2pm I think down to the quality of the floodlights at Highbury Avenue. However, I'm sure they have installed new floodlights this season so don't see why it would kick-off at 2pm. Just have to hope it is an error on the Fleetwood site and that it does kick-off at 7pm!

If I get there I will try and get some pictures and post them up to give some idea of the stadium!

[Bispham Seasider]

Blackpool line up -

1 Matthew Gilks
2 Shaun Barker
3 Ross Lloyd
4 Alex John-Baptsite
5 Marlon Broomes
6 Stuart Gree
7 Michael D’Agostino
8 Sone Aluko
9 Steven Kabba
10 Matty Kay
11 Dominic Merella

Subs
12 Ashton Bayliss
14 Jake Hobbs
15 Billy McKenna
16 Ashley Eastham
21 Mark Halstead

So a very strong Reserves team with club captain Shaun Barker makig his return to action.