Shrewsbury Town will be looking to remain in the top half of the League One table when they host Cheltenham Town on Thursday evening.

Cheltenham, meanwhile, can move one point behind their forthcoming opponents by claiming a victory.

Match preview

This is Shrewsbury's eighth consecutive season in the third tier of English football, having gained 50 or more points in all of those campaigns with the exception of one.

Steve Cotterill is the man tasked with taking Salop to the heights which saw them finish third in the 2017-18 campaign, ultimately missing out on competing in the second tier for the first time since 1989 after losing to Rotherham United in the playoff final.

Despite suffering a disappointing defeat away to Cambridge United on Boxing Day, the Shrews head into their home fixture against Cheltenham only six points outside of the top six positions, suggesting that they may have an outside chance of upsetting the odds in terms of their league finish this season.

However, after almost losing his life to illness last year, Cotterill knows as much as anyone that his side will need to take things one game at a time in order to continue punching above their weight at this level.

Cheltenham, meanwhile, almost certainly have more modest expectations having only gained promotion to this level two seasons ago.

That achievement was carried out by Michael Duff, of course, who has since moved onto pastures new with Barnsley. His replacement - and former teammate at Burnley during their playing careers - in the shape of Wade Elliott has performed above expectations so far, keeping the Robins above the dreaded dotted lines.

However, successive defeats to Forest Green and Plymouth Argyle has allowed Milton Keynes Dons in the first relegation spot to move within four points of them in the table, piling on the pressure ahead of their trip to Shrewsbury this week.

Elliott will take some hope from the fact that the last time his side scored two goals in a league match was against Cotterill's side at the beginning of October.

Team News

With three days between fixtures, both managers should be able to go as strong as they would like for this clash. However, Cotterill will not be able to call upon the services of Ryan Bowman, who was sent off despite only coming on as a substitute against Cambridge last time out.

Christian Saydee will almost certainly lead the line after bagging his fourth league goal of the season against the U's, which looked like being the winner until the home side's dramatic comeback.

Elliott, meanwhile, is unlikely to make any changes from the side which lost to league leaders Plymouth on Boxing Day.

His side generated 16 shots in total across the course of 90 minutes, suggesting that there was little wrong with the performance, even if the 44-year-old may be concerned by his side's overall lack of goalscoring prowess.

Shrewsbury Town possible starting lineup:
Marosi; Pennington, Dunkley, Moore; Pyke, Leahy, Winchester, Shipley; Bayliss; Saydee, Street

Cheltenham Town possible starting lineup:
Southwood; Long, Freestone, Raglan; Broom, Bonds, Sercombe, Williams; Olayinka; May, Nlundulu

We say: Shrewsbury Town 0-0 Cheltenham Town

With both sides generally more effective defensively than offensively, we can envisage a stalemate playing out at Montgomery Waters Meadow on Thursday.

Both managers tend to prefer a 3-4-1-2 formation, too, increasing the chances of the two sets of players cancelling each other out on the day.

For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.

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