Fylde welcome old friends and rivals Manchester RUFC to the Woodlands on Saturday (ko 15.00) looking to move a step closer to the championship the top of National Two (North). They will be looking to replicate the performance from the last home game against Westoe as opposed to last week at Loughborough where their 15 match winning run came to an abrupt end.

The fate of Manchester RUFC over the past three or four seasons has been a cautionary story for all National League rugby clubs. This famous club is celebrating its 150th anniversary this season and has a rich history. It has a fine Mini-Junior section and through this is deeply rooted in its community. Its record in the early days of professional rugby was patchy but it advanced to level two in 1999/2000 as Fylde were relegated to level three and they maintained this for a few seasons before dropping to level 3 in 2004/5. The club had a fine season in 2007/8 and once again were elevated to the RFU's second tier becoming one of the top 28 clubs in England.

However, it found the move to National One, as it was then called, one step too many and had a very difficult 2008/9 campaign at the end of which it was relegated. Worse was to follow, far worse. With the squad fracturing and finance becoming problematic, Manchester had a disastrous 2009/10 season in the newly titled National One (level three) when they lost all 30 matches and were regularly hammered by opponents. They scored just 114 points in these matches and conceded 2626, a national league record. A young squad with very little senior rugby experience went through that campaign with their heads high and never threw in the towel despite the demoralising effect of continual defeats. Their brave attitude earned them Lancashire RFU's Senior Club of the Season award.

Relegated to National Two (North) this season, things haven't been too different except that the size of the defeats have been somewhat less. Over two years ago, on 14th March 2009, the club had its last win, a 35-17 victory at home to Newbury. They have since lost 58 consecutive league games, scoring 269 points and conceding 3993 points at an average of 5 points for and 69 against. But to the great credit of the players and coaches they keep going and do their best in so many unequal contests. With a third successive relegation confirmed, everyone concerned for the health of North West rugby will hope that the decline can be arrested next season at level 5. Another famous NW club Waterloo has suffered a similar fate and they have struggled to stabilise at that level – so stopping the rot is very hard to do.

Although Fylde & Manchester, both famous names in North West rugby, have played each other many, many times over their long histories, there have been just three matches between them in the last fifteen years. The clubs faced each other in a Tetley Bitter Cup game at the Woodlands in October 2000 which the visitors won easily by 33-10. The next occasion they met was in March 2007 in a Lancashire Cup game at Grove Road when the home team triumphed by 46-29 in a highly entertaining affair which featured former Manchester player Nick Royle notching a hat trick of tries for Fylde. It seems extraordinary that these neighbouring North West clubs hadn't faced each other in league action since the onset of the professional era until the 26th February 2011 at Grove Avenue when Fylde took little pleasure by hammering the home side by 92-6.

The coach with perhaps the most difficult job in English rugby is Elaine Vassie who has been joined on the coaching front this season by Sale Sharks player Neil Briggs. Two local Fylde players know a fair bit about Manchester's recent struggles. Former Colts and students in the city, Tom Maden-Wilkinson and Danny Booth, have both featured in numerous Manchester line-ups last season and in the early part of 2010/11 but Tom has now returned to play for the Woodlands club. Perhaps the most loyal of the current squad of players is half-back and skipper Danny Carlton who has been one of the few regular players in what has seemed an almost ever changing line-up in the past two seasons. To illustrate the 'churn' of players in the squad, no less than 60 players have appeared in league matches to date this season. Sometimes in away matches they have struggled to field more than two or three replacements.

Other regulars this season have been forwards Gareth Stephens (prop), Yervand Agobiani (hooker) and Paul Farrington (lock). Prominent backs include wingers Matt Richards & Myles Hall, centre David Lewis and former Sedgley Park fly-half Dominic Kohler.

There's no doubt that the Manchester youngsters will raise themselves at the Woodlands and the home side will have to work hard and not be complacent in any way if they want to take full points from the game.

Fylde are pretty much at full strength as Mike Waywell, Steve Briers and Nick Royle return to the backline. Jason Robinson is named amongst the replacements and he will joined by back-row forward Harrison Collins who is in line for his Fylde debut

	Al Livesey		Martin Wallwork		Tom Lavelle / Tony Thoma
	Jonny Roddam		Steve Collins		Alan Holmes
	Pete Altham		Oli Brennand		Harrison Collins
	Paul Arnold		Mike Waywell		Callum McShane
	John Wells		Steve Briers		Jason Robinson
	Grant Ferguson		Nick Royle
	Mark Stephenson		Richard Kenyon
	Sam Beaumont (c)