John Still's Dagenham can strike at Bournemouth.
CHERRIES SET FOR DAGGERS BACKLASH
By Mike Holden
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Saturday's action in League Two delivered a couple of swift kicks to the nether regions between quarter-to-five and ten-to, but we won't allow that to deter us from following up on certain deep-rooted beliefs when play resumes on Tuesday.
Everything appeared to be going well at the weekend, until Kevin Ellison punctuated a sustained period of Torquay pressure by pouncing on a loose ball to put Rotherham in the lead at Plainmoor with barely five minutes left on the clock.
Then, moments later, about 200 miles north, our misery was compounded by Graham Coughlan as he punished Bury's earlier profligacy in front of goal by heading home a last-minute equaliser for Shrewsbury at the New Meadow.
So a sequence of apparent injustice continues on three fronts and that's where we'll be concentrating our efforts for the midweek action.
So let's start by siding with Torquay for their trip to Port Vale.
The Gulls have been improving by the game lately and though we should be a little concerned by their apparent inability to turn territorial dominance into goals, they deserve to be chanced again at a lucrative price against a side who are hardly formidable as an attacking force.
Vale consider themselves to be in good form at the moment, having tasted defeat just once in the last 10 outings, but they've averaged just one goal per game during that spell and seem to struggle with the responsibility of taking games to the opposition on home soil.
The two teams might be nine places apart in the basement standings but there's really not a great deal between them on current form - late defeats at home to Rotherham have been the only blot on both copybooks since September - so odds of 3/1 about the away win would appear to be a little inflated.
Of course, those recent aberrations do paint Rotherham in a rather flattering light that we still don't agree with and, by rights, we should be opposing the Millers once again.
However, we cannot allow ourselves to get too excited by the 6/1 on offer about Lincoln scoring a surprise success at Don Valley in light of their recent performances and the general air of pessimism being detected in the voice of new manager Chris Sutton at present.
So our next port of call is Hereford to beat Shrewsbury at 13/8.
The Bulls have won five of their last six matches at home, taking seven points from a possible nine against three of the sides who currently reside above Salop, so they certainly won't be fearing the visit of their local rivals on Tuesday.
It's taken a while for new boss John Trewick to stamp his identity at Edgar Street but he gradually appears to be getting new ideas across and there's every possibility that the hosts will be competing in the top half come the end of the season.
The Shrews will be setting their sights much higher, of course, but there has been very little evidence to support the case for a repeat of last season's seventh-place finish since they lost the quality that was being provided by West Brom youngster Joss Labadie earlier in the season.
Finally, have a nibble on Dagenham & Redbridge to beat Bournemouth at 11/4.
The Daggers were beaten by Rochdale in a top-of-the-table clash at Victoria Road on Saturday but they were magnificent and should have been out of sight long before the Lancashire club's audacious double salvo in the last 20 minutes.
The visitors had on-loan Manchester United goalkeeper Tom Heaton to thank for repelling wave after wave of home attacks but now John Still's men can quickly bounce back with expectations lowered for the trip to Dorset.
Events in Essex allowed Bournemouth to return to the top with victory at Macclesfield but the pressure that comes with leading the way didn't sit well with them in the seven weeks prior to them eventually being toppled.
A sequence of just two wins in seven attempts allowed Daggers to eventually reel them in 10 days ago but their next spell at the summit could be very short-lived unless standards improve dramatically.
Meanwhile, in League One, the fixture list has thrown up a series of mismatches and it's difficult to look beyond routine home wins for Charlton, Colchester, Leeds, MK Dons and Norwich against mediocre opponents, many of whom face sizeable journeys.
For those interested, the five-timer pays a shade over 8/1 with bet365 and though our intuition says that's not particularly great value, we should also point out that we probably wouldn't have the balls to lay it for too much money either.
Preview posted at 0735GMT on 24/11/2009
