Whitehawk return home on Saturday as fellow promotion-chasers Sevenoaks Town look to cause further twists and turns in this ever-evolving campaign.

It’s 4th vs 5th – the ground trembling at the prospect. And manager Shaun Saunders has offered his pre-match thoughts below.

So Shaun, onto Saturday, another crucial clash. It’s almost felt like every home game in recent weeks has been a six-pointer, and yet still the points flow. Is that purely testament to your side?

“I think the lads have been first class, all of them, to a man they’ve been great. Training, games; their application and their commitment has been reflective in our results over the last five or six games so yeah, they’ve worked really hard to be fair to them.”

Let’s discuss the opposition…Sevenoaks Town. What are you expecting from them on Saturday?

“It’ll be another tough one, but one again that we’re looking forward to. We got beat there so we’ll be looking to return the favour. But they’re in good form too, was told earlier that they’re top of the form guide and we’re closely behind them so it should be a cracker! But one that we’re really looking forward to. The games now, we’re at the business end and they’re all big games, no matter who you play, and I think at this stage of the season it’s going to be a big game.”

You mention their form, currently top of the pile with us a close second. Does seeing their recent results alter your gameplan? 

No, not at all! We’ve prepared as we have done for the last five or six weeks. We’ve prepared really well this week, we had a good session on Tuesday, got another good session planned tonight [Thursday evening], so we just go about doing our own thing and we can’t worry too much about others, just got to concentrate on ourselves. We’re at home – our form’s been good at home this season – so it’s all about us: preparing ourselves and making sure that we’re right on our end.

Obviously we know that they’re a good side, and we’re going to have to be on top of our game on Saturday to come away with all the points. So we’re expecting a tough one, but without giving too much away we’re well-prepared and we’re really looking forward to it.

Into March now and the table is starting to get a bit congested at the top…how crucial could three points be for your side?

Yeah, like I said earlier we’re at the business end of the table and every point’s a big point. They’re big games now, they come thick and fast, we’ve got some real big games coming up, everyone’s got to play everybody and I’ve said before that there will be twists and turns – we’ve just got to make sure there aren’t many twists and turns at our end! 

But we’re in a really good place, and we need to keep ticking over, keep our form going so we’re really looking forward to it, and excited to be in the mix for what’s going to be a very exciting run in! So yeah, we’re in a good place, there’s no doubt that we’re enjoying ourselves at the moment and we want to keep it going for as long as we can.

We’re going to give it everything we can between now and the end of the season to make sure that we get ourselves into a good position come the end of it. It’s pressure, but it’s good pressure.