Puritans close to reaching first target

The Puritans’ 1-0 victory at Dorchester Town last weekend, courtesy of a late Mark Bell penalty, moved them to 47 points and kept them in the hunt for a play-off place.

But, as they prepare for another away-day at Kings Langley on Saturday, boss Ford isn’t getting carried away as he keeps his focus on achieving the first main aim for the season.

He said: “We are now three points away from my first target of 50 points and that will keep us in the division for next season. Once that is done then we assess where we go from there.

“People may talk about us staying the course but, to use the horse racing analogy, we are probably at fence 20 of 30. All it takes is for us to fall at the next fence and we could be out of the race completely.

“So all I am interested in at the moment is Kings Langley on Saturday. They had a great win at Dunstable on Tuesday and they have had some good results of late, it’s another tough test and we have to be right on it.”

Ford felt last Saturday’s success in Dorset was as good as any other win his team have had this season.

It came off the back of a highly-charged bank holiday win against leaders Leamington and Ford was delighted to see his team follow that up.

“We had three home games on the first three Saturdays of December so we knew this run of away matches was coming,” he added.