Macclesfield welcome Chester for big play-off encounter

In the National League North play-offs, it’s John Rooney’s Macclesfield who have home advantage against Chester.

The Blues have been on a brilliant run of form to make sure of their top-seven finish and in their sequence of wins is a 2-0 outcome at Macclesfield earlier this month.

Interim boss Rawlinson told Chester FC TV: “Obviously, I think they’ll have more of a grasp of what we’re like under my tenure and, obviously, we know what they’re going to be like.

“I think it was a game of two halves there. So, I think it’s going to be which team’s going to grab the game by the scruff of the neck and really try and dominate the ball and run hard.

“But, you know, we always knew it was going to be hard. We were playing for seventh when I took over.

“So, we’ve ended up seventh. We had a chance at fifth, which would have been unbelievable to have another stadium full like this and packed, and I really wanted it.”

Victory at home to King’s Lynn Town last Saturday would have seen the Blues finish fifth, but they had to be satisfied with a 0-0 draw.

This brought an end to an 11-game run that yielded 26 points for in-form Chester and Rawlinson is so proud of what the players have achieved of late.

He said: “I’m bursting with pride for them, because what they’ve done for me and the staff, they’ve gone that extra yard.

“They’ve gone to places where not many players are willing to go.”

Aiming to cause the Blues heartbreak is ex-Chester star Rooney, who scored 30 goals in more than 100 appearances at the club.

He told the Macclesfield website that Chester’s Easter Monday victory counts for nothing.

“Chester are a good side but it’s a play-off and anything can happen,” said Rooney, who rested a number of players in Saturday’s 1-0 defeat at Radcliffe where former Blues boss Bernard Morley is in charge.

The National League play-offs also kick off tonight with Forest Green Rovers, managed by ex-Macc boss Robbie Savage, heading to Boreham Wood