Shuker is ready to fit into any role against Glovers

Sep 1 2007 by Our Correspondent, Liverpool Daily Post

IT IS little wonder Chris Shuker has a soft spot for Yeovil and a fondness for Huish Park in particular. The Tranmere Rovers winger plundered two fine individual goals on his visit to Somerset last February.

They were the sort of strikes that perfectly showcased Shuker’s impudent ball skills and eye for an opening – abilities that mark the 25-year-old from Huyton as both a crowd-pleaser and a match-winner.

Shuker remembers the day well and the two goals with relish.

“The first came when I cut across on a run down the right after John Mullin made a quick throw. The second was taken after I cut into the penalty area from the left,” he recalled.

The double earned a high-value result against opponents who shared Tranmere’s promotion ambitions at the time.

But while the Glovers went on to make the play-offs, Tranmere’s victory turned out to be something of a high watermark for their hopes of securing a top-six finish. It was largely downhill after that.

Rovers return to the out of the way corner of the West Country this afternoon with the two teams once again in the League One promotion frame – albeit after just three games of the new campaign.

And Shuker looks forward to the contest with the same boyish optimism he felt on his last visit.

Shuker said: “I think Yeovil did ever so well to make the play-offs last year and you have to give them credit for that. They probably overachieved to be honest.

“We showed them some respect when we went there last season, playing a different system that we’d practiced during the week. It worked for us. We defended well and had them on the break with the two goals in the second half.

“I think we can go there and beat them again because we are playing well at the moment.”

The change of system manager Ronnie Moore introduced on that last visit to Huish Park was a switch to a 4-5-1 formation.

Tranmere may adjust their tactics again this time, but for different reasons. Injuries to Gareth Taylor and Calvin Zola, the squad’s two powerful strikers, mean Moore will have to put his faith in a fluid, lightweight attack.

Shuker says he is up for any adjustment to his own role and can usually find enthusiasm for switching flanks, as he did successfully in his last appearance against the Glovers.

He points out he has plenty of experience of playing on the left, having operated as a left-winger during his Manchester City days – before Barnsley signed him in 2004 and switched him to the right.

“Playing on the left is easier to cut in and get the ball onto my right foot,” Shuker says.

“I played there for six years with City. I learned to go on the outside of people and dink the ball in with my left foot.

“Now I’m learning to shoot with the left, my coming inside from the right. I’m getting better at it.”

Shuker says he is encouraged by the quality of Tranmere’s early-season performances, even though the first two results, against Leeds United and Stockport in the Carling Cup, did not go their way.

He said: “The performance level has been good since the season started and I honestly believe we deserved to win all four of the games we’ve played.

“I felt we played well against Leeds on the opening day and deserved the three points. We were pretty disappointed about losing that one.

“I think we also played well enough to have won the Carling Cup tie at Stockport.

“We certainly had enough chances that night.

“The important thing was we did not allow ourselves to get downhearted. We took the positives out of those two defeats into the game the Gillingham and now we have won two in a row. I think we can make it three.”