When we consider Bryan Hughes’ time as manager of Wrexham, it’s impossible not to consider his misfortune with injuries. Manny Smith was never fit enough to play for him, player of the season Rob Lainton has yet to take the pitch this time around and, having missed half the season, JJ Hooper became available for selection two days after Hughes had departed.

Hooper’s absence has been a massive blow, and hopefully he’ll be fit enough to put in 90 minutes today, having built himself up with 20 minutes on Saturday and 33 on Tuesday.

The goals are certainly not flowing as freely with Hooper out of the picture. With him on the pitch this season we've scored every 62 minutes; without him, it's taking 20 minutes longer to score - every 82 minutes.

The goals have dried up for the other forwards since Hooper's injury. Mark Harris, who hit the net in three consecutive matches at the start of the season, hasn't scored since Hooper pulled up at Hartlepool, and while Bobby Grant has got three goals since then, two were penalties. His other goal came on Tuesday, after Hooper came on. Neither Grant nor Harris have scored in open play this season when Hooper wasn't on the pitch.

Or, to use a rather more telling statistic, before Hartlepool we played 6 games, all of which Hooper started, and won 9 points. Our only defeat came when we were leading at Dover but were reduced to ten men before half time. While he was injured we played 6 league games and accumulated just 2 points.

Hooper has chipped in with a couple himself, of course, but his movement is equally important to our attacking play. He spins off and attacks the space behind defences, stretching them and offering a passing option.

That movement has been crucial in the way Wrexham were trying to attack this season. Our support strikers would come narrow and break into the spaces Hooper vacated to sniff out chances. Two of Harris’ goals came that way, while Grant did the same at Borehamwood and headed home against Barrow by attacking the six yard box while Hooper went wide and delivered a cross.

In Hooper’s absence Jason Oswell has played well, but he’s a very different type of striker. More of a fixed point of reference, he battles with centre backs and creates knock-downs for the likes of Grant and Harris to feed off. The problem is he then stays in that central position, blocking the runs which were made so profitably into the space Hooper creates.

That’s not a criticism of Oswell by any means; he just isn’t that type of player and we ought to have adapted our strategy to take that into account.

It was telling to see what happened against Ebbsfleet in that context. Oswell renewed the scrap he had with Fleet skipper Jack King last season and won it comprehensively. He beat the centre back regularly in the air, and when he didn’t, his presence forced King into mistakes and poor clearances. Yet we didn’t really look like profiting from his work until Hooper came on and started running beyond him.

Our attacking players all profit from Hooper’s movement. Let’s hope he stays fit for the new manager!

Wins have been hard to come by at Woking. We’ve taken The Cards on in their own back yard seven times and emerged victorious just once. That was in October 2015 when Connor Jennings scored the only goal after 28 minutes. Jennings had a frustrating time despite netting the winner, as he missed a number of good chances which would have made the victory more emphatic.

Having said that, oddly we had already won at the Kingfield Stadium before Jennings struck. In the 2011-12 season Hayes and Yeading played their home matches at Woking, and we beat them 2-0 there, with Nat Knight-Percival and Mathias Pogba scoring the goals.

Otherwise, we’ve drawn three and lost three at Woking. We have a better home record against them, though, and if we avoid defeat tomorrow we’ll have gone four games unbeaten against The Cards, our longest run in this fixture.

Our last game at Woking was a frustrating affair. It was the first game after Dean Keates’ departure, and we travelled south well-established in the play-off places, while the home side were fighting relegation.

We fell behind early on to a Josh Staunton goal, but the centre back generously made amends by equalising twenty minutes later! Marcus Kelly put us ahead on the hour with a free kick from a wide position which he claimed was a shot rather than a cross, and it looked like we’d emerge victorious.

However, we conceded with ten minutes left and began a process which saw us slide out of the top seven, although the point wasn’t enough to help save Woking from eventual relegation.

Andy Bishop and Dean Keates are the only Wrexham players to have managed more than one goal against Woking, with two apiece.

Jake Lawlor plays his fiftieth game for Wrexham today.