Swifts need six wins for safety

Stourport Swifts boss Neil Hunt believes another six wins will make for a succesful first season in charge.

The Swifts notched a fortunate win over Malvern last week and face two more relegation battles in the shape of Berkhamsted and Woodford this week.

Wins in those two games would take Swifts near to the magic total of eight victories in 20 games that Hunt set his side when he took over last month.

“When I took over I looked at the remaining 20 fixtures and thought a reasonable season would have been six or eight wins in that sequence. Since then I’ve had two wins, a draw and four defeats so I am looking to improve,” he said.

“But I’m not thinking about relegation, mid-table or the play-offs – it’s about notching up as many wins as we can so we can start building for next season.

“And if we can get to six or eight wins then I think we’ll have done quite well.”

The Swifts chief is hoping to bring in another three new faces to add to the two new signings he’s made this week.

The Swifts finally completed the signing of Simon Fitter and also added attacking midfielder Justin Ballinger to the squad. To complete a busy week of dealings Hunt reluctantly released Craig Marsall.

“We need to bring in a few more faces and so I decided to let Craig go, which was a difficult decision because he’s got a brilliant attitude and he’s a really nice lad,” he said.

“He trained superbly and I never had a problem with him but I just felt that I needed to bring in someone with a bit more goal threat to play up front.”

Hunt admits it has been difficult to mould his own team with injuries and suspensions biting hard.

“I’d love to be able to bring more players in. We are getting injuries and suspensions here and there and it’s a case of coping with what we’ve got at the moment. But I can’t fault the attitude or commitment of the lads, we’ve got 20 players at every training session and that is the sort of thing you’re asking for.