‘Nicky Ajose is bound to score the winner’. As we prepare for Saturday’s trek to Crewe, the natural optimism of Town fans abounds once again.

Before CW2 6EB has been punched into a satnav or a single train boarded, there is already a certainty that the ‘Immutable Law of the Ex’ will strike.

If you aren’t familiar, it’s one of the game’s most deeply held certainties - that former players always score against their old clubs.

The bad news is that the effect seems real.

A study of 402 Premier League matches found that ex-players did perform beyond usual expectations.

Conclusive? Not really. It was based on match reports and who is most likely to make something of a returning player than a newspaper?

Well, apart from football fans that is.

No, we pay more attention to former players because we recognise them.

So, it is quite natural that we think they were more involved than the blokes we couldn’t tell from Adam (Rooney).

The reality is that recently, our exes haven’t really troubled us. We’ve faced 34 of them in the last two seasons and only three have scored.

On Tuesday, both Alan Sheehan and Stephen Darby played and they went away defeated (again).

Darby was even sent off, and then let back on.

The only ex-player who has scored against us this season is Darius Henderson and that was a 90th minute consolation.

Obviously you are now screaming that Alex Revell is always trouble, and you are right.

He’s started eight times against Swindon and scored eight goals – which is enough to make him the most successful ex-Town player against us since the 1930s.

But who is the worst (or perhaps the best)? It is probably local boy Steve Mildenhall who has faced Town nine times and lost seven of them.

However, for pure schadenfreude you can’t beat Dave Bamber, who scored twice against Town after leaving but still couldn’t get Swindon out of his blood, putting into his own net in a 6-0 defeat for Stoke City.

For the record, Ajose hasn’t yet scored against Town. This will be his fourth try.