Brady believes Cobblers benefitting as hectic playing schedule eases

In a hectic start to the season, with the Cobblers playing Saturday-Tuesday-Saturday for the majority of the opening three months of the campaign, they completed 21 matches in the space of 13 weeks.

But the workload has eased significantly since the end of October.

Town will go into Saturday's Sky Bet League Two showdown with Tranmere Rovers, their first at home since October 29, having played just three matches in the past 35 days, with Brady's team having last weekend off due to their first round FA Cup defeat at Chesterfield on November 5.

That was obviously a huge disappointment at the time, but bowing out of the Cup has given the Cobblers some valuable breathing space.

It has allowed injured players to regain fitness, those on the mend to improve their sharpness, and allowed Brady and his coaches to really get to work on things in terms of team shape and improving quality.

Town will go into their date with Rovers off the back of two highly impressive wins on the road, beating struggling Gillingham 2-0 and then outclassing promotion rivals Bradford City 3-1 in their most recent outing at Valley Parade on November 19.

And Brady says those results were partly down to fact the team had a full week prior to playing to prepare properly, with the fact there are more bodies available thanks to injuries clearing up also a key factor.

"I think you can see the difference over the past two weekends, where we have had players back training," said the Cobblers boss.

"We have been able to work on things, and really work on our structure, what we do, and our strengths.

"I think you can see the energy and tempo to us has really risen as well, and that has been hugely important.

"Probably in the previous weeks prior to that, it was quite tough, it was a bit bitty, and there weren't many on the training ground.

"We were unlucky with the numbers we had, but you see now when we have got numbers back and we are able to work on the training ground on certain stuff, it really does make a difference to our performance."

Tranmere also had last weekend off following their FA Cup first round loss at Carlisle United.

Micky Mellon's side are currently 12th in the league two table, 12 points adrift of third-placed Cobblers.

They are on a run of eight matches without a win, and having claimed three points since beating Crewe Alexandra 3-0 on October 14.