Bradford City are expecting their lowest Premiership crowd for Saturday's match against Southampton.

The club still had 2,150 tickets left this morning and chairman Geoffrey Richmond said: "At the moment we are looking at a crowd of 16,000, and the message to our supporters is that there are plenty of tickets available."

City's gates have only twice dipped below 17,000 since they were promoted from Division One.

Their lowest gate was 16,766 for the Leicester match on August 26.

The worst figure last season was 16,864 for the clash with Watford.

Richmond believes that the Southampton gate is being hit by the fuel crisis with people deciding not to go to Valley Parade to buy tickets in advance.

He said: "That could also be the reason why Southampton have not sold as many tickets as last season,"

"Last year they brought 1,300 supporters with them, but so far they have sold only 450 for Saturday's match.

"They are expecting some more sales, but I am expecting them to be about 1,000 short of capacity in our visitors section and it looks as if it will be the lowest crowd since we went into the Premiership."

Meanwhile, City have been dealt a double injury blow with the news that David Hopkin and Ian Nolan will miss their next two Premiership matches.

Both players were hurt during Tuesday's 1-0 Worthington Cup second round first leg win at Darlington

But there was relief at Valley Parade when a scan on Hopkin's damaged ankle revealed no broken bones.

Nolan has a hamstring strain and could also miss Northern Ireland's matches against Denmark on October 7 and Iceland on October 11.

City coach Malcolm Shotton said: "Although David's ankle is badly bruised and swollen we are relieved there are no bones broken."