Tomorrow sees an important clash take place at the Abbey Stadium with both Plymouth and Cambridge facing uphill challenges to achieve their end of season goals.
Plymouth have slipped out of the automatic promotion spots in recent weeks and are now three points off third placed Oxford United. The Pilgrims go into tomorrow’s game knowing that anything but a win will leave their automatic promotion hopes in tatters.
Meanwhile Cambridge kept themselves in with a slight chance of making the play offs with an impressive victory at Notts County last weekend.
Shaun Derry’s side still have it all to do however as they are currently five points behind AFC Wimbledon in the race for the final place off place.
Form
Cambridge have found a good run of form in recent weeks but it may be too little too late to make it into the play off picture.
Derry’s side are unbeaten in their last six games and have won three of their last four matches. This included an incredible 7-0 thrashing against Morecombe two weeks ago.
Plymouth’s form has been a bit more patchy with Derek Adams’ side losing three of their last five league games, including a really disappointing home defeat to already relegated Dagenham & Redbridge last week.
This relative downturn in form has seen the Pilgrims be replaced by Accrington and Oxford in the automatic promotion places.
Team news
Derry has named the same starting XI for the last two games but could be tempted to bring Ryan Donaldson into the side after the midfielder returned from injury.
Cambridge will still be without Connor Newton and Greg Taylor, who are unlikely to feature again this season.
As for the visitors, Carl McHugh and Reuben Reid may be fit enough to come back into the side after struggling with injuries.
What the managers have said
Derry told the Cambrudge News that his side must push on from last week’s impressive victory and cause Argyle problems all game.
The 38-year-old said, “It was a real good performance, but it’s a performance that’s gone, it’s in the past.
“What we proved that day though, was that we could mix it with the top teams at our level and I think that gave everybody a large amount of confidence to carry forward.
“It was a big occasion for us because I suppose it was a performance that gave everybody some hope to go forward.
“That hope we’ve backed with some really big performances and we’re sat here in eighth position with two games to go, so we’re very proud of that at this moment in time.”
There was a slightly different mood in the Plymouth camp this week and Adams focused on the necessity that his side respond well to last weekend’s shock defeat.
“Nobody saw the result against Dagenham coming because we came off two very good away victories.
“But we had 85% possession against Dagenham, we had numerous opportunities, we should have won the game, but that’s the nature of sport and the nature of football. If you don’t score your goals and you concede easy ones then it’s going to give you a problem.” said Adams.
He continued, “We must win on Saturday, there is no two ways about it,” said Derek.
“We’ve put ourselves in the position where with two games to go we still have the chance of finishing in the automatic promotion places, but we do need to win the match.
“They [Cambridge] are like ourselves; both teams have got to kick on this game, from our point of view we’ve got to go there and be positive, and get at them from the start.”
Final day fixtures
Cambridge – Mansfield (a)
Plymouth – Hartlepool (h)
