The Opposition - History
Cleethorpes Town are a relatively new team, formed as recently as 1998.
Progress through the leagues was swift during the 2010s, with promotion from the Lincolnshire League in 2012 followed by the NCEL Division One title in 2014 and finally the Premier Division in 2017 which brought them to the NPL where they have been ever since.
Also in there was a trip to Wembley for the FA Vase final in 2017, where they lost to South Shields.

The Opposition - This Season
The Owls enjoyed a great start to the season, going undefeated in their first six matches in all competitions, conceding just three goals.
However back to back defeats followed at the end of August and September saw both cup runs ended, with defeat to Hanley Town in the FA Trophy and Alfreton Town in the FA Cup.
They soon picked up again, with five wins in a row but found November and December tricky, failing to win in that period.
The new calendar year brought better fortunes, going undefeated in their first four fixtures of 2024 but back to back 1-3 defeats against Dunston and Consett followed.
February saw a bit of a catchup on fixtures, with five matches played and plenty of goals.
The month started with a comfortable home win over Bridlington but defeat against North Ferriby followed.
There was a glut of late goals when they travelled to league leaders Stockton but they ended up on the wrong side of a 3-4 defeat.
They bounced back to defeat Ashington 2-1 but were eliminated from the Lincolnshire Senior Cup by Scunthorpe United at the semi-final stage in front of 561 fans.
Recent weeks have seen good victories over Carlton and Winterton, at the weekend they defeated Brighouse Town 2-1 thanks to a brace from Josh Walker and they come in to this fixture fresh from beating Belper 2-0 on Wednesday.
Their last two fixtures see them entertain Stocksbridge before heading to Ossett United.

Managers Tim Lowe and Liam Dickens took over in March 2023 and Will Annan leads the scoring charts with 11, backed up by Josh Walker with 10 and Curtis Bateson with 8.

They currently sit 9th with the following record: P 35 W 13 D 10 L 12 F 51 A 46 Pts. 49.

The Nailers
Belper come in to this match off the back of a poor performance against Cleethorpes on Wednesday. Before that it was a late win over Sheffield on Bank Holiday Monday, with last weekend's fixture at Liversedge postponed along with the previous Saturday at Pontefract, leaving the Nailers with a fixture headache heading in to the home straight of the season.
Belper sit 6th in the table with a record of P 33 W 17 D 6 L 10 F 62 A 46 Pts. 57.
At home, the Nailers have won 9 out of 17 matches.
Kevin Bastos leads the way with 18 goals. Cam Johnson secured 8 before his move to Sheffield. Curtis Burrows and Phil Watt have 6.

Head to Head
The Owls and the Nailers have met eight times.
The first three produced some crazy scorelines, with a 4-4 draw at Cleethorpes in October 2017 followed by the Nailers going down 0-7 at home in the reverse fixture.
The following season saw another heavy defeat for Belper, this time 1-5 away but they finally picked up their first (and to date only) victory in the fixture back at Belper in April 2019.
Cleethorpes have won the four fixtures since then and the overall record from a Belper perspective reads: P 8 W 1 D 1 L 6 F 8 A 24.

Form Guide (League)
Cleethorpes Town - (16 Mar) DWWLWW (10 Apr)
Belper Town - (17 Feb) DLDDWL (10 Apr)

Team News
Karl Demidh has served a one match ban and is available for selection again.

Permutations
Victory for Belper could lift them to 4th if both Pontefract and Newton Aycliffe fail to win.
Carlton will overtake the Nailers if they win and we don't. North Ferriby are three points behind but 22 goals worse off.
For Cleethorpes, they climbed in to the top half of the table with victory on Wednesday but they can't go any higher just yet, with five points separating them from North Ferriby in 8th.
They could slip back to 11th if they fail to win, and both Consett and Grimsby Borough win their home games.

Match details
Belper Town vs. Cleethorpes Town
Northern Premier League Division One - East Division
Saturday, 13th April 2024 – 3:00pm kick off
Raygar Stadium
Bridge Street
Belper
Derbyshire
DE56 1BA
Tickets: Adults £11, Concessions £7, U11s £0

Follow the match
Live commentary is available with Tom on Radio Belper Town - https://radiobelpertown.mixlr.com
Full coverage on X (Twitter). Team news, HT & FT scores on Facebook.
Match reports to follow on the website and in the Non-League Paper.

Elsewhere in Division One East

It's bottom versus top at Winterton as Stockton look to keep Hebburn at arm's length. Their north-east rivals face a tricky trip to Grimsby Borough.

A good fixture for Belper - provided they can do the business themselves - is 4th v 7th as at least one of Newton Aycliffe and Carlton Town will drop points.

(14th) Ashington AFC v Grantham Town (19th)
(17th) Brighouse Town v Pontefract Collieries (5th)
(10th) Consett AFC v Liversedge (13th)
(11th) Grimsby Borough v Hebburn Town (2nd)
(4th) Newton Aycliffe v Carlton Town (7th)
(18th) Ossett United v North Ferriby (8th)
(12th) Sheffield v Dunston (3rd)
(15th) Stocksbridge Park Steels v Bridlington Town (16th)
(20th) Winterton Rangers v Stockton Town (1st)