Hitchin Town Football Club
Founded 1865, Reformed 1928
Daunting task for Canaries
Wednesday, October 24 2007
Hitchin Town travel to Weymouth on Saturday for their biggest FA Cup game in six years.
Not since 2001 have Hitchin reached the fourth qualifying round of the competition and the task could not be more difficult than an away tie against Blue Square Premier opposition. Although Weymouth are below mid-table, they are two rungs above Hitchin in the non-league pyramid. “It’s a tough game, but we’ve come through a couple of hard games so far and we will lack nothing in terms of motivation. The stakes are high,” says Manager Darren Salton.
Weymouth have won three of their last four games, including a 2-0 victory at Kidderminster last Saturday. Hitchin and Weymouth have met before, most recently in 2000-01 season when the Canaries were beaten 2-0 at the Wessex Stadium in the FA Trophy. Only Carl Williams remains from the Hitchin squad that played that afternoon. Older Hitchin fans will recall a four-game saga in the FA Cup first round that ended with the Canaries winning 3-1 at neutral Salisbury.
Hitchin have reached this stage of the FA Cup 24 times, starting in 1931-32 and including memorable occasions in 1973, 1976, 1994 and 1995. The Canaries have won through to the first round proper eight times: 1953, 1958, 1973, 1974, 1976, 1978, 1994 and 1995.
If Saturday's game is drawn, the replay will be on Tuesday, kick off 7.45pm.