Crawley Town v Port Vale preview: Reds look to avoid fourth straight loss in visit of high-flying Valiants

While Crawley have hit a poor patch of form, their opponents are flying and find themselves in second in League Two.

Vale have recorded a very impressive six wins from their last eight league games, with just one defeat in this time.

They have former Crawley man Jamie Proctor to thank for a lot of what’s gone right for them this season. He has grabbed seven goals in 13 games this campaign. That’s half the amount he managed in 67 games for Crawley between January 2013 and June 2014.

Manager Darrell Clarke has got the Valiants playing very well, after making a lot of changes to the squad in the summer.

Clarke can take a lot of credit for turning things around at Port Vale, since he joined from Walsall in February.

However, only a couple of bad results could see Clarke’s side fall down the table. Vale are just three points away from dropping out of the play-off places despite sitting second.

The same could be said about Crawley. The Red Devils sit 16th, six points outside the play-offs and six points clear of the relegation zone.

The last three games have damaged Crawley, with last Saturday’s defeat at Scunthorpe being the poorest of those three results.

It was a performance which John Yems described as 'the worst' that Crawley have played since he arrived at the club.

That type of performance can’t happen again or Crawley will be staring at another defeat.

A positive result is much needed for John Yems’ men on Saturday but that is much easier said than done against a team in fantastic form.