Sam Ashford

I've just had a look at the table comparison between this campaign and last and have noticed that we have exactly the same amount of points after 26 games (which is what we've played so far) as we did after 26 last season. Don't know if that could actually be considered an improvement in a way because we had Max Watters for a lot of those games last season who did win us quite a few points with his exploits.

Still a very long way to go in the season and apart from top spot, which I think is done and dusted already, it is looking pretty tight for the promotion/play-off places and I'd say any team down to Rochdale in 17th could still get in them if they put together a great run of results. For example Mansfield were right down near the bottom in mid-November, now they are only 3 points off the automatics with a couple of games in hand. Obviously I might start to dream a little if we win our next 5 games say but 11th place with 62 points would be a success in my eyes considering how worried I was back in November and the terrible injury record we have had.

Ashford got off to a good start up in Scotland which is good for him, he's the type of player that needs to be in the first XI regularly if he's to make an impact and unfortunately with Appiah, Nichols and Nadesan being higher up in the pecking order that was unlikely to happen here. Probably best for him in the long term too because if he didn't leave last month I reckon there was a strong likelihood he would have been trying to find a new club in the summer anyway