The Fleetwood Town manager, Micky Mellon, on the excitement that surrounds the FA Cup derby with Blackpool
There has certainly been a bit of banter around Blackpool and Fleetwood for this local derby: even Father Christmas asked me for two tickets so that was something new, that Santa Claus is a Fleetwood fan ? me and the kids found out. He tried to get two tickets off me. I thought it should have been the other way round. I thought he'd have been giving the tickets out.
The tie has been on us now for a few weeks and we're determined to make sure that we enjoy it and make most of the occasion, which is the most important thing, because these events don't come round all the time.
There isn't actually that much spice between the clubs: we last played each other 31 years ago, also in the FA Cup, when Blackpool won, so not much has happened between us. A lot of Blackpool fans come and watch us, and a lot of our fans watch them. Of course there are the diehards who support just one club, but the likes of myself and Craig Madden, the assistant manager, and other lads have played for Blackpool so there's connections there.
I played there under Sam Allardyce, Gary Megson and Nigel Worthington so I had some great times, very fond memories. But for the minute I'm all about Fleetwood and I'm desperate to win the tie. The best result is still for us to put them out. We'll be going into the game to try and win it, we won't be suffering an inferiority complex, we'll go to try and progress in the tournament.
But, also, you'd probably be lying if you say you won't be excited about this tie and will not be preparing for it differently to a game against a team in our league, because we've got to show respect to Blackpool, they are playing at a higher level than us.
Their players hold to a level of consistency to keep them competitive while trying to win a place back in the Premier League. But it doesn't daunt us, we're not afraid, we feel we've got players that will cause Blackpool problems, no doubt. But, certainly, we've got to pay special attention to players in the Blackpool team for us to try and get that result.
Ian Holloway will be taking it seriously ? he's been to watch us play, that's him being professional. We've been to watch them play a couple of times as well, so we know everything there is to know about them.
Fleetwood are second in the Conference, the highest position in their history, and this is the furthest the club has been in the FA Cup. I believe we have the right structure, a great chairman, Andy Pilley, a good fan base, and we're full-time: so we have the set-up to do the toughest thing in football in England, and that's to win a prestigious place in the Football League. It's not going to be easy but we're going to be as competitive as the better teams in the division and hopefully get there.
The money from the Cup run will certainly not hurt, especially in the month of January ? it gives me the opportunity to go to the chairman and ask if there is any chance of him sharing a few bob of it around, which he's never been backward about.
And the publicity and the attendances from the Cup run also help: the players have been terrific in creating some history for the club and these are great times.
Interview by Jamie Jackson
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/jan/06/fleetwood-town-blackpool-fa-cup
Kevin Shattenkirk David Shields Jaime Sifers Jonathan Sigalet
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