PREVIEW | Eastleigh (A)

THE DETAILS

Eastleigh v Wealdstone

Vanarama National League

Silverlake Stadium

Saturday 5th March, 3:00pm kick-off

TICKETS

Tickets for Saturday's game MUST be purchased online prior to kick off. Tickets are priced at £15 Adults, £10 Concessions, £5 Students/Age 17-21, £2 Juniors aged 12-16 and U11s go FREE as do disabled carers. You can get your tickets for Saturday's game by clicking HERE.

THE CONTEXT

Eastleigh's new boss Lee Bradbury begins managerial life at the Spitfires as the Stones make the trip down to the Silverlake Stadium as his first opponents. The former Havant & Waterlooville boss joins after the Hampshire club parted company with Ben Strevens in January. The Spitfires were winless in caretaker boss Jason Bristow's month in charge, whilst the Stones come off of indifferent results form but a string of positive performances.

TEAM NEWS

Nikola Tavares and Jack Cook both returned to the side in Saturday's 1-1 draw against Torquay United which boosted the Stones defensive options. Medy Elito missed the game with illness and David Sesay hobbled off early in the second half, aside from that and the long-term injury to Andrew Eleftheriou the Stones have a full squad to choose from.

WHAT WAS SAID?

Matt Saunders: "They're obviously going through, I don't want to say transitional period, but a tough period for them. They've got good players and good people around them at their football club so I have no doubt they'll turn that round but every team goes through tough periods.

"We've not really had one of those this season in terms of going winless in eight which has happened to some of the big boys this season. They're just in one of them periods that any team can go into at the moment, they've changed their manager and I'm sure they'll set their team up well and hard to beat and will have a point to prove.

"They probably look at us as a winnable game but we also go there looking at it the same way, they're in bad form, we're in good form in terms of performances so we've got nothing to fear, we'll go there try to win the game and do the things we've been doing well."

FORM GUIDE

Stones:

Torquay United (H) 1-1 D (Mundle-Smith)

Solihull Moors (A) 1-2 L (Okimo)

Wrexham (H) 1-2 L (Browne)

Barnet (A) 1-3 W (Ferguson, Umerah, Mundle-Smith)

Yeovil Town (H) 2-1 W (Umerah, Tavares)

Eastleigh:

Boreham Wood (A) 1-0 L Southend United (H) 1-1 D (Pritchard)

Notts County (A) 2-0 L

Weymouth (A) 1-0 L

Yeovil Town (H) 0-0 D

WHO TO WATCH FOR?

Tom Broadbent: Whilst the side has struggled up the top end of the pitch to score goals since Ben House's departure, Broadbent has been an assured presence at the back of the pitch helping the Spitfires in being a tricky side to break down. A summer signing from League One side Swindon Town and with over 50 EFL appearances at both the Robins and Bristol Rovers, he will again be a presence up against the Stones forward line.

HEAD-TO-HEAD

Played - 6

Won - 2

Drawn - 1

Lost - 3

LAST FIVE MEETINGS

Oct 2021 - Stones 1-2 Eastleigh - (Umerah)

Feb 2021 - Stones 0-0 Eastleigh

Dec 2020 - Stones 4-3 Eastleigh - (Wakefield, Cawley, Lewis, Mendy)

Nov 2020 - Eastleigh 2-0 Stones Jan 2005 - Stones 1-4 Eastleigh - (Jolly)

Preview by Chris Woods