Monday 24th March 2008

Kick-off 3pm

The Silkmen reach a significant milestone today in their relative short Football League career. The visit of Barnet is our 500th regular season game in the league and probably represents one of the most important ones with vital league points up for grabs. The teams had contrasting fortunes over the weekend but that will all be forgotten come kick-off time with the Silkmen looking to record back to back home victories for the first team this season.

KEITH'S THOUGHTS ON THE GAME
"Monday's game with Barnet was always going to be the more important of the two fixtures this weekend. The Moss Rose is where our fate will be sealed and we need a repeat of the result against Shrewsbury to keep that five point gap between us and safety. We lacked a bit of quality on Friday at Stockport but the lads have an opportunity to put that behind against Barnet who will no doubt have been buoyed by their win on Saturday."

OPPO's CURRENT FORM

The Bees' comprehensive 5-2 victory over much improved Lincoln on Saturday took them to a points' tally of 45 and the relative security of mid-table. They currently sit 15th in League Two with nine games left to play.

Away from home the team from Underhill have struggled in recent weeks with just one goal and one point from the last four trips. They record reads P17 W5 D4 L8 F14 A23 Pts 19

Beaten:

Chesterfield (1-0), Stockport (4-2), Wrexham (2-0), MK Dons (1-0), Hereford (2-1)

Drawn:

Morecambe (0-0), Dagenham (1-1), Wycombe (0-0), Notts Co (0-0)

Lost:

Brentford (2-1), Bury (3-0), Shrewsbury (1-0), Chester (3-0), Lincoln (4-1), Darlington (1-0), Peterborough (1-0), Grimsby (4-1)

LATEST ODDS

Bet365 make the Silkmen favourites at 5/4 to win the game. Paul Fairclough's men are at 9/5 to pick up all three points with the draw at 12/5.

ONE TO WATCH - Adam Birchall

The former Arsenal trainee joined the club in November 2006 from Mansfield and has been a regular scoring in that time. He got back on the goal trail again at the weekend, bagging a pair in the 5-2 thumping of Lincoln, taking his season's tally to eleven.

MAN IN THE MIDDLE
Cumbrian official Mike Pike is the man in the middle for this afternoon's encounter with Barnet. Like us he made his first appearance in the Football League back in 1997 and in the intervening years has been a regular visitor to the Moss Rose.

Today's game will be his thirteenth in charge of the Silkmen, eleven of those being home matches. And by and large we have tended to fair well, suffering just two defeats in that time. Our first meeting with Mike occurred back in September 1998, a goal from John Askey helping us to a 2-1 over Reading. His last visit to the Moss Rose came last season in the 1-1 draw with Darlington, Alan Navarro scoring late on.

Prior to the weekend Mike had taken charge of 21 games so far this season, issuing 41 yellow and one red card.

PAST ENCOUNTERS

Since we joined the Football League we have hosted Barnet five times in League action, the Bees picking up just one win and one draw in that time. The first of those encounters took place in April 1998. The Silkmen ran out 2-0 winners with first half goals from Efe Sodje and Phil Power.

The teams on display that day were as follows.

Macclesfield:

Price,Tinson, McDonald, Payne, Howarth, Sodje, Askey (Chambers 70), Wood, Sedgemore, Power, Whittaker (Durkan 77)

Barnet:

Harrison, Stockley, Harle (Goodhind 67), Heald, Howarth, Basham (Samuels 56), Doolan, Wilson, Devine, McGleish (Charlery 60), Simpson

Bookings: Harle, Howarth, McGleish (Barnet)

Attendance: 4171

Early this season we played out a 2-2 draw at Underhill, the Bees coming back from two down to equalise in injury time.