Port Vale: Goal drought leaving Vale high and dry

SO, RATHER than welcoming old foes West Brom to Vale Park for our first game of the New Year, we will be travelling to Darlington instead.

It would have been a decent draw, given the FA Cup history between the clubs, but there's no point dwelling on it.

We battled hard against Huddersfield on Saturday, but no efforts on target tells its own story.

Mind you, I still can't believe how Marc Richards didn't manage to nail his early chance.

Huddersfield's passing ability clearly illustrated they were a team from a division above us, and once behind we just weren't good enough to really threaten an equaliser.

But at least this season we haven't bowed out in an embarrassing fashion, like the past three years.

Lewis Haldane played well and threatened a lot, but didn't always deliver. Of course, if he could score goals (just one would be a bonus), he would be with a club higher up the leagues than ours.

Bearing in mind our scoring problems, I just don't understand why Louis Dodds doesn't always start games.

Fair enough, he isn't a powerhouse player, but he has got talent, particularly for scoring, and you can't say that about too many members of our current squad.

Rob Taylor is similar, but I admit he always seems better as an impact substitute.

Simon Richman impressed me last season, but he can't get a look in, possibly because he is more suited to a 4-4-2 formation.

Back to the league then, and what we have seen so far can be taken two ways. The optimists will say we've only lost four games, but the pessimists will point to the fact that we have only won four as well, which is very poor at this stage.

To rectify the latter, we need to score goals. Who knows, Sean Rigg might solve the problem, particularly after his 'man of the match' performance against Torquay.

It was a bit silly to allow a bunch of Torquay fans to pick the award, whether they have sponsored the game or not, probably something the real man of the match, Anthony Griffith, was also thinking.

I know Rigg needs time to settle in, but loan players don't have that luxury. A poor first few games and they are gone.

The promising start to the season has evaporated a bit.

We have won one of our past nine matches, and by the time Morecambe come to Vale Park on Saturday, we will be three months without a home league win.

That simply can't go on or some fans will be having end-of-season parties before their Christmas celebrations.

We simply must try to do a bit of wheeling and dealing in January to get a bit of interest going. Winning the odd home game would help as well.