The young Blues play their second fixture in this year’s EFL Trophy tonight at the stadium where the curtain fell during last year’s competition. Here, we preview the action ahead of kick-off...

Competition and league form

Andy Myers and the development squad got their season underway in this competition at the beginning of the month away at Oxford United. Despite an encouraging performance, the night ended in a 2-1 defeat as Jon Russell’s goal wasn’t enough to complete a comeback.

In Premier League 2, it's been two wins from three - deserved three point hauls over West Ham and Southampton were dampened by a defeat at Brighton on Friday night.

The opposition

Walsall have four points from their opening two League Two games. Their weekend fixture against Leyton Orient was suspended due to a number of positive cases of Covid-19 in the London club’s camp.

Last meeting

Our last meeting with Walsall was in last year’s EFL Trophy competition. We escaped the group stage thanks to Russell’s last-minute goal at Plymouth which set up a knockout stage visit to the West Midlands.

A fast start saw Tariq Lamptey notch a brace within the opening 10 minutes. We took that lead into the break but a regrouped Walsall were level by the time we had reached the 80 minute-mark. The devastating blow came four minutes deep into injury time through Dan Scarr who sent his side through to the next round with the last kick of the game.