View from the opposition – Newport County
A bit about you:
Name: Paul Tully
How long have you supported your team? 65 years since, as a 7-year-old, I saw Billy Shergold score from a corner v Millwall in old Division Three.
Overview of your club
Please tell us a bit about your club:
We lost our Football League status for over 20 years until we won it back five years ago and were in danger of losing it once again three years ago when eleven points adrift in League Two with ten games to go.
It was then that Mike Flynn, a Newport boy, was appointed manager in a situation where I believe everyone at the club and beyond believed we were dead and buried, except for Flynn who, with the same squad of players, produced seven wins in those games to secure the great escape and safety on the last day of the season via an 89th minute winner against Notts County.
Since then, with probably the smallest budget in the league, Flynn has consistently got us punching above our weight and he can do little wrong in the fans’ eyes.
And what about your recent cup history:
Last season in the cup we defeated Leeds with a very late winner and were within eight minutes of beating a strong Spurs team, for whom Harry Kane got that late equaliser. And we only lost the replay 2-0 at Wembley.
Favourite period played by your team & why: The club have had far more downs than ups but the time in the late sixties when a young John Aldridge led an attack which took us back into Div 3 and into the semi-finals of the European Cup winners Cup where we were genuinely unlucky to lose to Carl Zeiss Jena of the then East Germany, was the time I look back on as the fondest.
About our forthcoming match against you:
How do you think you'll do against us? I genuinely can’t see us producing an upset against Leicester because we are currently beset by injuries to a small squad and playing our worst football of the season. Nevertheless we will fight to the end whether a goal down or six down, that’s the mentality under Flynn. I go for a 3-0 Foxes win but if Leicester show any complacency, they may have a long time to regret it.
Forecast Time ……..
Who do you think will eventually go on to win the FA Cup? Chelsea to win the cup