Gosport Borough boss Gale dreaming of adding another FA Cup scalp to his collection against Hereford

Lovely bubbly - Shaun Gale (foreground) is sprayed with champagne after Hawks beat Swansea in the FA Cup in January 2008 - now he is aiming to mastermind Gosport's win against higher tier Hereford in the same competition. Pic: Dave Haines.

The Borough boss has enjoyed some of his best footballing moments in the famous competition.

Memorably, during his tenure as Hawks manager, he guided them to a fourth round tie with Liverpool at Anfield in January 2008 where they twice led before losing 5-2 in a blizzard of international coverage.

That same season Gale masterminded FA Cup giant-killing victories over Notts County, Brentford and Swansea.

Now he has another cup shock in his sights - this time over National League North outfit Hereford.

Gosport's division-higher opponents arrive for their first competitive fixture since March and Gale believes his team can catch them cold in their season-opener.

‘I’ve got quite a bit of history with the FA Cup from my time at Havant,' he said.

‘We had some great ties, not just at Liverpool, and got through.

‘It’s a competition that’s close to my heart and it’s brought me some of the best moments in my life as a manager.

‘It’s going to be a really tough game on Saturday.

‘Hereford are a really good outfit and they ply their trade a league higher than us.

‘We’ll have to be at our best if we are to come through.

'We’re positive, we’re at home and we’ve got one chance - anything can happen.

‘We’re not over confident, as in we’re too big for our boots, but I want to make sure we give Hereford a right run for their money.

‘If we can do that, that’s all I can ask of the players.'

Southern League Premier South Gosport are deemed a non-elite club so are able to welcome up to 600 supporters for the tie.

However, with Hereford at step 2, current FA guidelines prevent any away supporters visiting Privett Park.

Gale is calling on the local population to come out in force and make it an intimidating atmosphere.

'Hopefully the fans will turn out,' he remarked.

'The town of Gosport really needs to get behind us as a club.

'Our Feed the Family project that we’ve done has been great for the club and we’ve relished people coming and really getting behind the boys.

‘We can only have 600, we can make it an intimidating atmosphere and an intimidating place for Hereford to come and play.

‘We’ve got to use every single thing we can to try to get us through.

‘That means the fans getting behind the team from the first minute until the last and everything we can do on the pitch.'

Borough will be without Theo Lewis (hamstring), Mike Carter (Achilles) and ex-Pompey defender Matt Casey (fractured foot).

But Gale is hopeful striker Elliott Charles can recover from a bad back to play.