Yet another chapter of the Cobblers’ goalkeeping hoodoo has now been written after Matt Duke’s parent club, Bradford City, had their number one keeper John McLaughlin sent off, along with two others plus two Crawley players, at the end of last night’s game. The FA have launched an investigation into the brawl that happened after Crawley had won 2-1 at Valley Parade after punches were thrown from both sets of players.
But, back to being selfish and looking at the implications to my own team, it leaves us with a dilemma once again having already lost December signing Shane Higgs to a long term injury just three games into his Cobblers career and Chris Weale to a knee injury suffered during the 1-0 win over AFC Wimbledon last month.
Duke was brought in as the third goalkeeping signing that Aidy Boothroyd had made in as many months but this time it’s Bradford who have held the key to us losing another stopper. Should Boothroyd go down the loan route again to replace Duke then whoever was brought in would be the FIFTH keeper to play under his reign with Freddy Hall also featuring around Christmas and the New Year!
It’s a real blow to the Cobblers with Duke having helped the club to put a distance of five points between us and the bottom two thanks to three clean sheets in the last four games so whatever happens now he will be one of the people to send a huge thank you to at the end of the season should we finish the job of surviving.
A Load Of Cobblers 