Fleetwood v Walsall - Match Postponed

The match was called off at 1.30pm after referee Scott Duncan carried out an inspection of the Highbury surface.

The pitch was playable at 10am but several hours of heavy rain left a number of areas waterlogged.

Duncan said: "I've had a good look at the pitch and arrived early at 11.45 where I spoke to the groundsman.

“There's a lot of standing water on the pitch which is dangerous, and we've got to look at the game as a spectacle.

"If we do play a game in conditions like these you could end up losing two or three fixtures in the future.

"After consultation with the groundsman it's clearly obvious that it hasn't stopped raining here.”

Both managers agreed the decision was the right one - Fleetwood boss Steven Pressley taking his team for an additional training session at Poolfoot Farm.

Steven Pressley said: "The ball wasn't even rolling.""It's not just the right decision now but for longer term."We are a team who like to play, to pass."If we had played there could have been longer term effects."It would have been a real mudbath."

For groundsman Dale Frith the loss game was a real blow - Town's last postponement having been in 2008/09 in the Northern Premier League.

He said: "I've been here five years and this is the first one we've lost since I was here."I've never seen the pitch as wet as this, certainly not for a 3pm Saturday kick off."There was no chance.

"At 9am we'd had 4mm of rain and the pitch was fine."By 1pm we'd had another inch, it was just non-stop."It's been constant over the last few weeks."