Saturday afternoon sees Swindon Town travel to Gresty Road in Crewe…

Form Guide… 

First placed Swindon are currently on a run of two defeats in twenty-four League Two matches. Town’s current form guide reads five wins and one defeat in six outings.

Away from the County Ground, Town have four victories and two defeats in six matches, including that defeat last time out at Oxford United.

Swindon haven’t kept a clean sheet in eight away matches in League Two.

9th placed Crewe sit three points outside of the play-offs, having completed a remarkable and steady rise up the division since Dario Gradi stepped down as boss earlier this season. Could Alex be the side to mount the late surge into the play-offs?

Crewe are unbeaten in six League Two matches, having won twice and drawn four. At Gresty Road Crewe are unbeaten in six matches with four wins and two draws, however the previous two home results were those draws.

Swindon-Town-FC.co.uk Head-to-Head…

Town have faced Crewe 25 times, with a record of 11 wins, 4 draws and 10 defeats, in very low scoring matches scoring 25 and conceding 25.

At Gresty Road, Swindon have 4 wins, 1 draw and 7 defeats, scoring 10 and conceding 16.

Town last won in Crewe in April 2003 when a Stefani Miglioranzi strike gave Swindon a 1-0 victory.

Swindon-Town-FC.co.uk From the Archive…

On the final day of the 1985/86 season, with Swindon already assured of the Fourth Division championship, they went into the game against Crewe, knowing that victory would result in a League record for the most number of points gained in a season. In a tense match, Peter Coyne finally scored the only goal of the game in the 70th minute – the Town breaking the record with 102 points, and after a huge pitch invasion, skipper Colin Calderwood was handed the championship trophy.

Ten years later, with both sides going for promotion this time from the Second Division, Swindon managed to do the double over the Railwaymen – a late, twice-taken penalty from Steve Finney handing the Town the points at the County Ground in October 1995, before a superb performance at Gresty Road resulted in a 2-0 win the following April, the goals coming from Kevin Horlock and David Preece.

A few years later Town’s trip to Cheshire in the 1998/99 season yielded another 2-0 victory thanks to a Wayne Allison double.

Crewe vs Swindon 07.11.1998

What The Stats Say… 

The match sees Swindon, who remain the most efficient side in the division, face 18th ranked Crewe, according to our latest rankings.

Here are how the teams perform in each of the five attacking and defensive measures, when assessed against the rest of the division…

Defence					Attack
	Crewe(Hosts)	r	STFC    (Away)	r		Crewe(Hosts)	r	STFC   (Away)	r
Shots Against Per Game	12.2	23	8.2	1	Shots For Per Game	10.9	13	10.6	5
% Shots Against on Target	49.8%	11	49%	9	% Shots For on Target	48.7%	18	48.9%	17
% Save Rate	75.7%	9	77%	9	% Strike Rate	15.1%	6	11.7%	15
Corners Against Per Game	5.6	18	5.1	3	Corners Won Per Game	4.3	24	6.1	4
Possession Conceded	50.8%	20	47.4%	1	Possession Won	49.2%	20	52.6%	1
R = rank: The ranking shown for each measure indicates the efficiency of the sides against the rest of the division as either hosts or the away side | TheWashbag.com

You think Crewe and you imagine cleaver passing and plenty of possession, however as hosts they’ve won 49.2% possession which is ranked 20th in the division. Whereas, Swindon have won the most possession on the road this season on our travels, however for that time on the ball we haven’t matched it with points.

In attack, Crewe’s only saving grace as hosts has been their better than average goals to shots ratio which stands at 15.1%, ranked 6th in the division.

In defence, Crewe have conceded the second highest shots per game as host and a high number of corners, so we can expect Swindon to dominate and create plenty of chances.

Having said all this, these statistics are over the season as a whole and don’t highlight Crewe’s rapid improvement over recent weeks.

SCORED	1-15	16-30	31-45	45+	46-60	61-75	76-90	90+
Crewe (at home)	3	5	4	0	4	6	4	2
STFC (away)	1	6	4	0	3	3	3	1

The sides are relatively well matched in the timings of goals scored, however Crewe are stronger towards the end of the matches as hosts.

CONCEDED	1-15	16-30	31-45	45+	46-60	61-75	76-90	90+
Crewe (at home)	4	5	2	0	3	4	5	2
STFC (away)	1	4	2	0	4	4	2	0

Crewe have conceded more in the opening 15 minutes and in the final 15.

Kickoff.co.uk Prediction…

Result: Swindon Win 67% | Crewe Win 11% | Draw 22%

Full time result: Swindon 1-0 17% | Swindon 2-0 15%| Swindon 1-1 10% | Swindon 3-0 9% | Swindon 0-1 6%

My prediction… 

Don’t expect a repeat of the 3-0 scoreline that flattered Town on the opening game of the season as Crewe are one of the form sides as hosts.

Town will take the majority of the possession and look likely to dominate in shots and corners, but our failure on our travels to date has been the poor goals to shots ratio, so that needs to be put right quickly with some tricky trips until May.

I see our defence holding firm and Wes is good enough to deal with Crewe’s strong strike rate, so a 1-0 victory to Swindon is my prediction, with the goal scored in the final 15 minutes.

Come on You Reds!

Copyright Andrew Smith and  licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence