MALVERN Town boss Les Jones says his team will need to go on a ‘huge’ winning run if they are to get back into the West Midlands (Regional) League Premier Division promotion race.
Jones was speaking after his side were comprehensively beaten 4-0 by league leaders Haughmond on Saturday.
The Hillsiders found themselves 3-0 down within the first 25 minutes as the league’s pace-setters proved too much for a Malvern side who were missing Dene Whittal-Williams, Reece King, Matthew Turner and Max Kontic-Coveney.
Jones said the better team won on the day but were helped by individual errors from his depleted squad.
“Without doubt, Haughmond were certainly the best team we’ve played all season.
“We had a poor first half and made several errors which gifted them a 3-0 lead – then it was game over.”
Malvern remain third going into the Christmas break but now sit a significant 16 points behind Haughmond having played the same number of games.
Last season Malvern ended the campaign in impressive fashion by winning ten successive games.
Jones said his team will need to repeat history if they are to push for promotion.
“We are now 16 points adrift of Haughmond so it is vital we go on a winning run starting from the new year,” he added.
“We want to finish as high as we can. As we’ve shown last season, the players are more than capable of putting a great run of wins together and if we can do that and some of the top teams lose a player or two then things could change.”
Malvern’s next league match is at Dudley Town on Saturday, January 7.