The chance of drawing a big boy, £40,000 on offer, what bigger incentive for Jim and the lads to go out and make the 4th round. In what could be Jim Gannons last match in charge, County take on the league 1 'big boys' after a good point against Cheltenham Town in a much improved performance.

The story so far......

Stockport County                                            

  1st rnd beat Swansea                                                     

  2nd rnd beat Hereford

  3rd rnd drew Brentford 

 Brentford

  1st rnd beat Rochdale

  2nd rnd beat Oldham after replay

  3rd drew County

My prediction is an optimistic 2-0 to County with Hamshaw and Dickinson scoring for County. Heres to a County win!!!   

Well what a turn around! Jimbos first chance to impress the  Edgeley faithful as a manager, and bloody hell he did it with some style. Jim made a number of changes from the anhilated team at Macc, Damien Allan came in for Danny Boshell, Rob Clare replaced Ross Greenwood and Dean Crowe replaced the suspended Bramble. Ashley Williams also came into the back row for 'Jimbos new look blue and white army'

   The change in personel seemed to spring County into action as they did much of the early pressing as the Hatters went in search of their first goal in 360 minutesof football.

Harpal Singh was the maker of the first County goal. His cross into the box was fumbled by Shane Higgs and Matty Hamshaw was on hand to put the ball in the net. His celebration said it all.

But in the 2nd half the Robins were quick to equalise before debut youngster Liam Dickinson scored a superb climbing header after a Hamshaw cross into the Cheadle end box. Sadly the 4 minutes of extra time proved 4 too many as Town scored again.

MATCH STATS

Date :	Mon 02 Jan 2006	Kick Off :	15:00
Venue :	Edgeley Park	Attendance :	3777
Comp :	Coca-Cola Football League Two	Referee :	A Marriner
Goals :
Hamshaw 35 Dickinson 76		Wilson 69 Finnigan 90

For the 2nd time in 4 days, Stockport County and Jim gannon have been denied play due to the weather. The first postponent game on Wednesday night ( 28th) even though referee, Neil Swarbrick was happy with the state of the pitch at a four o clock pitch inspection. However at a later pitch inspection the ref was forced to postpone the game to a later date, to the dismay of many Torquay fans who had made the 7 hour + journey up to Stockport.

It was a similar story today at Gigg Lane where coach fulls of County fans were turned away at the gate following a 2nd pitch inspection despite the fact that Garry Sutton was happy at an earlier hour for play to go on, but terrential downpour for the next 3 hours meant he had no option but to turn away the fans.

Still maybe this break will allow the players and Jim to freshen up and who knows maybe 2006 will be a year to remember at Edgeley park......

Happy new year everyone.  

Stockport County have taken the unusual step of appointing a caretaker coach to work with temporary boss Jim Gannon.

And the Hatters faithful will be delighted to learn that it's another County legend, Peter Ward, who will be working with the squad until the appointment of a permanent managerial team.

Danny Bergara brought the midfielder to Edgeley Park from Rochdale in 1991 when he formed, with David Frain, one of the club's best-ever midfield partnerships.

Comfortable on the ball and tenacious in the tackle Wardy also became something of a dead-ball specialist and the majority of his 17 County goals came from free kicks.

After 183 appearances in County Blue the former Huddersfield player was sold to Wrexham for £50,000 in 1995

He also became hugely popular at the Racecourse where he added 155 appearances to take his career tally to an impressive 482, scoring 47 goals.

Yestarday (tuesday) Jim gannon was named as the new caretaker manager of Stockport County. Jim who is 3rd in the 'all time County appearances' flew in from his native Ireland and said that he was proud to be able to try and help his former club.

Jim takes over from Chris Turner who failed to impress as he won just 7 of his 51 matches for the Cheshire club. Jim who claims him and his family are county fans, was at the match at the moss rose as county went down 6-0 to their local rivals, Macclesfield. ' it's hard to see the team that you have moved up the leagues, with a great bunch of fans, to be struggeling at the very foot of the football league' said Gannon. So lets hope Jim really is the man to save our county!!!