I never saw much value in the A414 as a child. Ware was a stop on the old Great North Road, what use was a road going east to west? But now I'm reminded of the old road signs in the town telling us that the A414 was the road to Chelmsford. It still is even if it's been diverted south of the town now.

And now I imagine it’ll carry a bit of extra traffic this Saturday as the FA Cup brings the Clarets and their fans to Wodson Park. Everyone travels in happy expectation on these occasions but will they return to Essex in good spirits? The form book says yes but that doesn’t always hold true in the FA Cup.

That said, City play two Steps higher than us and are doing well. Two recent defeats have set them back a bit but they remain in a play-off place in National League South. We on the other hand have not yet found consistent form and last week’s defeat at Hadley saw us out of the FA Trophy with a disappointing performance.

The two recent pre-season friendlies with City will, I think, offer a poor guide to a competitive game of which there has been only one previous to this. That was also in the FA Cup, a 1-0 defeat for the Blues over in Essex thanks to a late penalty won and scored by Peter Taylor of Spurs and England fame.

Amongst their playing staff now is Charlie Ruff who had a spell in the Ware youth system before moving on to Hertford where he played under our current manager Paul Halsey. We look forward to welcoming Charlie back to Wodson Park.

That previous meeting was in the third qualifying round of 1985 with just the gate money to be shared plus a bit of glory for the winners. Not so now, there’s £3,375 from the prize fund for the winners and £1,125 for the losers.

The match day programme, available at the gate for £1.50, includes Aiden’s latest in his Astroturf series looking at the recent heat wave and former player Anthony Anstead. Meanwhile you can also read Paul Halsey’s views on our last two matches.

Naturally we’d like to see as many people at Wodson Park as possible but if you can’t make it don’t forget that live commentary will be available from Pete Hill and Symon Allemandy on https://www.spreaker.com/show/90minuteslive. Always worth a listen if you can't get to the game.