After a slow start away from home in which they didn’t win on their travels until victory at Farsley on November 2, Quakers have won four out of their last five at Radcliffe, Needham Market, South Shields and Kidderminster, and only lost at Leamington, to help put them within sight of the play-off places.
Now, they’re looking for their first win at Southport since 1970 to keep the pressure on the leading clubs. They’re in tenth place, five points behind seventh-placed Kidderminster, who have slipped since Quakers beat them in January when they were top of table.
Assistant manager Terry Mitchell said: “Our away form is very good at the moment, obviously we want to continue that.
“Southport has a very good playing surface, and we’ll be going there confident, looking to continue that good form.
“When we played them earlier in the season and beat them 3-0, they were well in the game and they had some good chances, but we took ours.
“Since then, we’ve changed our side a bit and they’ve brought some loanees in over the last couple of weeks.”
Quakers enjoyed a comfortable win over Marine last Saturday to put them in a good frame of mind.
“We did well in the whole game,” added Mitchell. “It was a really good performance. We scored two penalties and a free-kick, and we created a lot of good chances and we worked the goalkeeper. We attacked the game and hopefully we can do the same again on Saturday.
“We didn’t want Tuesday’s game to be postponed (at Alfreton), because we had a couple of players coming back into the squad. The extra days have given them more time to get fully-fit.”
Quakers are now facing the task of playing 17 games in ten playing weeks before the end of the regular season on April 26.
“It’s a good position to be in,” said Mitchell. “Compared to last season, we’re fighting for something at the right end of the table. We go into every game to attack it.
“We’ve got a really busy schedule ahead, lots of Saturday/Tuesday games, but we’re going to give it a real go and look forward to the next few weeks.”
Midfielder Caden Kelly returns after a trial at Stockport, as do strikers Jack Maskell and Andrew Nelson after injury. Midfielder Ali Al-Shabeeb is also back after being unavailable for personal reasons. Defender Kallum Griffiths returns after serving a one-match ban.
Southport are currently 17th in the table and lost 4-1 at Radcliffe last Saturday.
