The U's-letter: Issue 35

Your regular update of goings-on at the Abbey

Mar 20, 2026

The run-in is up to its old tricks, and we’ve not even got into the business end of it yet. A draw at Walsall on Tuesday was fine in isolation, but the other results have made the league table look much more bunched than we would like to see it. The good news is Saturday presents an opportunity to put a bit of daylight between us and at least one of the chasing pack. As Harris warned in his presser, there will be ups and downs, we’ve just gotta ride it and do our best to enjoy it!

Keep reading to get a view from the opposition from both Gillingham and Walsall, and a quick preview of Saturday’s visitors, amongst other good stuff we’ve seen this week.

Remember, the Coconut Tier is just £5 a month, less than the price of a pint. You’ll get extra pods (including recent interviews with Knight, Bonner and Josh Coulson), a written preview and report of every league game, and weekly feature articles (this week a look at the stats around the division from our statman Ben).

Let’s get into it…

What’s New? 📰

MORE kick off time movement: Bromley away is now a Thursday evening, thanks to Sky Sports.
And Grimsby at home has postponed due to international call-ups, meaning we’ll likely play them either Tuesday 21st or 28th.
The latest pod is here to listen to, previewing Saturday’s game alongside One Up Front blog:

At The Match ✍️

U’s 5-0 Gillingham: 14th March 2026

Saturday was all set up to be a testing afternoon against a team who would surely show some resilience as they looked to rebound from a midweek pasting against MK Dons.
Instead, as soon as a second Cambridge United goal went in to remove the worry that a dominant first half would be insufficient to secure the points, the question of whether United would win was replaced by one asking how many they would win by.
Beating a dreadful Gillingham side, even at a canter, does not confirm that the U’s will go up this season, but it was day in which they demonstrated all the attributes that have made them such strong contenders this season.
A danger from set pieces. Able to run at defences and get in behind them. Defensively strong. It all clicked together, culminating in Cambridge United scoring five in a home game for the first time since May 2018.
One thing that hasn’t been seen very often is an early United goal. There’s never a bad time to knock one in, but against a side so heavily beaten five days prior it set the tone for the day. Gillingham never came close to scoring, never mind making the game a contest.
Read in full:

Walsall 0-0 U’s: 17th March 2026

It’s a long, long road to success in football. And, unfortunately, it can’t be 5-0 wins in glorious Saturday sunshine every week; there’s plenty of Tuesday night 0-0s in Walsall shaped potholes along the way. But when there’s also the option of the car coming off the road entirely, a little bump in the road might just be a feeling we need to get used to.
That is, if you even class Tuesday’s point as a bump in the road at all. Plenty of U’s fans left the Bescot Stadium happy simply to have not lost the game. Considering the pressure Walsall put on us in the second half, in isolation that’s probably true – we have drawn against worse sides, put it that way.
But, regardless, when we’re playing a team with the 17th best home record in the division, who hadn’t won at home since Boxing Day, against which we didn’t register a single shot in the second half, and on a night where the rest of the top 6 all won, is it possible to take it in isolation? Was it actually a decent point but a bad night, where we lost ground on every team in the automatic hunt?
The standards you have to set for a top 3 finish are high, but with 9 games still to play the chances are we look back at the draw and class it as another point notched onto the board. Because one thing is for sure, it was a hard-fought one.
Read in full:

View From The Away End 🧐

Gillingham - Gills In The Blood

From an MK Dons perspective it felt like a really tough game against a well-organised Cambridge side.
You made it difficult for us to create a bunch of chances, despite the two big ones we had and when Shayne Lavery put you ahead it honestly looked like the points might be staying in Cambridge.
Fair play to the Dons for sticking at it though, we kept pushing and the late penalty from Aaron Collins was a big moment right at the end. In truth, a draw probably wasn’t the worst result for either side as it was pretty evenly contested overall.
Cambridge looked a strong outfit: disciplined, competitive and clearly tough to break down. It felt like the kind of game between two sides who might determine the main challengers to Bromley at the top and I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s a fixture that is significant later in the campaign.

Walsall - Yellow Ribbon Podcast

A game that was the definition of a 0-0. Although I would argue we edged the chances that were created, there really wasn’t a lot in the game. You moved the ball well and we held our shape and limited you to very little, which was very pleasing to see given your scoring record.
I said on the pod that it would be battle fought where you would be fighting to break us down and we would be fighting to hit you on the counter. Both defences stopped it from happening. Like I said, I felt we limited you to very little, but equally you halted any sniff of a proper counter attack at the earliest opportunity.
Not a game that will live long in the memory but a well earned point for the Saddlers in my opinion

Opposition Preview 🔮

Salford (H) - 5th Place - Saturday 21th March

Last 5 (all comps): WWWWL - Four wins in a row after a run of five losses in a row.
Last time out: Salford 0-0 U’s, 8th November 2025. The start of our run and a good point and clean sheet away from home.
Our H2H: P5, W1, D1, L3. Not too much history in this fixture, for obvious reasons.
Manager: Karl Robinson. He’s a known quantity and likes to play front-foot attacking football.
One to watch: Ryan Graydon. Huge January signing, impressive for Fleetwood before moving on.
Former U’s players: No but it has to be mentioned somewhere that Fabio Borini plays for them, and scored a brace in midweek.

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Under The Other Stands 🏟️

We’re only concentrating on the top of the division for now as we all have run-in fever at UTAS HQ. Starting with the race for the title, Bromley remain top after squeaking through against Bristol Rovers and Newport. Without talisman Michael Cheek these are impressive wins, but they’re finding a way more than blowing teams away, at Newport especially where the relegation-battlers can feel hard done by not getting a point out of it. MK won again on Wednesday, beating Colchester. They haven’t lost since New Year’s Day and are looking very ominous.
Below us, as mentioned everyone had a good week; Notts County recovered from a home defeat to blow Accrington away, 4-0. Salford breezed past Barrow and Swindon did the same at Gills. Everyone except ourselves has a fixture they would be expecting to win, so the pressure might still increase some more.

Stats Corner 🔢

In scoring against Accrington and Gillingham, Appéré scored in successive games and has four goals in nine matches, having netted only once in the 21 before that.
Also on our number 9, Appéré’s 0.26 xG per shot is actually the 2nd-highest of the top 20, only behind Jatta’s 0.31 xG per shot. This shows how decent of a position Appéré can get into when shooting.

For more of that sort of stuff, check out the Stat Pack: