Ben Herd / Ben Herd / 20 May 2009 / Leave a comment

Shrewsbury's right-back looks ahead to the Play-off final against Gillingham, assesses his own season and tells us what he learned from a length spell on the sidelines.

So, the biggest week of the season and to be honest, in a professional sense, our lives, are upon us.

A trip to Wembley beckons on Saturday. By all accounts, the girls in the ticket office tell me that tickets are selling well and Shrewsbury will probably take over 20,000 fans. With Gillingham expected to sell their allocation of 38,000, it looks like it's going to be a great atmosphere at the national stadium.

As I've said many times before, a few of the lads and I have already experienced a Play-Off Final at Wembley, and truth be told, the preparation the first time we went wasn't exactly spot-on. Don't get me wrong, we did stay in a lovely hotel (where Gazza got married) but it was a good hour away from Wembley and we ended up training at 6pm on the Friday night before the big game - not exactly something you do every week.

This time around, we are leaving on the Thursday and heading down to my neck of the woods (Hertfordshire) to an amazing hotel called The Grove. On behalf of the lads I think a massive "thank you" must go to the Chairman for sanctioning our stay at this top-notch hotel. I'm sure this time around, the preparation will be kept as "normal" as possible and it will be nice to finally get to the hotel and leave all of the chaos of tickets etc. behind.

Obviously promotion is by no means a foregone conclusion, and I'm sure Gillingham will have plenty to say about it. Their two obvious threats are Simeon Jackson, who has scored a bag full of goals for the Gills, and Simon King, their centre-half, who is probably the single best player they have.

Ironically, in the two previous games against us, King had to go off due to injury and that really cost them in those games. Like I've said in previous articles about opposing teams, you have to respect them, but fundamentally it is a case of "it's down to us".

Promotion for a club like Shrewsbury means everything. Living locally for the past four years, I understand what it would mean to our loyal fans, and if you look at the club as a whole, it really is geared up to playing at a higher level. Promotion, financially speaking, is probably more important now than in recent years due to the economic climate. Promotion would bring with it an increase in revenue, ticket sales, merchandise and just about anything and everything else.

Going from League Two to League One is definitely not in the same bracket as going from the Championship to the Premier League in terms of finance, but the biggest incentive of all as a player is going to grounds like Elland Road and St. Mary's next year.

Saturday is the last game of the season and it is at this time I reflect upon my own season. It started off really well for me and it was the first time I felt that I was allowed to play my natural game of getting up and down and basically being an overlapping full-back. The manager gave the lads license to express themselves and play what I deem to be the right brand of football.

Unfortunately, those lovely men in black seemed keen on showing me a never-ending string of yellow cards for some reason, thus me getting suspended, which ultimately cost me my place in the team. I played a few games after this, but nowhere near how many I would've liked to have played. But instead of sitting here reflecting on the negativity, I try to focus on the positive things.

In my eyes, I have improved as a footballer; watching games has perversely given me the opportunity to take a step back and view the game from a different perspective. Also, going through not playing has made me a stronger person "upstairs", which can only benefit me in the long run. I've always gone into training every single day determined to give 100 per cent and maintained a positive attitude, so at the end of the day I can look in the mirror and say I've done all I could and no footballer (or human being for that matter) can do any more than that.

Two teams battling it out to be performing in the biggest stage in English football next season are Sheffield Utd and Burnley in the Championship Play-Off Final. Kevin Blackwell and Owen Coyle should both be applauded for reaching this stage, especially the latter for pushing Tottenham so far in the Carling Cup semi-final!

This will be my last week as a football tipster, and I must admit that when I first started doing this I was shocking. But God loves a tryer and if you look at my recent tips, you'll see I haven't done too badly.

No pressure then, but the Championship play-off semi-final games haven't exactly blown me away and I suspect that this encounter probably won't either! I can definitely see this being a tight game with few goals so get on the Under 2.5 goals at around [1.7]. For some reason I have this nagging feeling that Burnley might just shade this one and the value may therefore be to back Burnley to be promoted after extra-time in the "Method of victory" market at [9.0].