DARLINGTON are desperate to beat the weather as well as Ilkeston today in a bid to maintain the momentum created by winning each of their last two fixtures.

After overcoming Hyde United and Blyth Spartans, the latter a real boost to promotion hopes, Quakers hope to make it three wins in a row with a long-awaited homecoming game against Ilkeston, though the match is again facing the threat of being postponed.

There shall be a pitch inspection at 9am, with Quakers keeping their fingers crossed that the fixture does not suffer the same fate of their last four home games.

All four were postponed after failing an inspection.

As a consequence of not playing at Heritage Park since October, the club have said a planned fundraising initiative will be launched sooner than planned having missed out so much income in recent weeks.

And on Thursday Quakers loaned a machine from Marske United to help dry out the Heritage Park playing surface.

“We’re desperate to get the game on,” admitted manager Martin Gray. “We’ve had a couple of good performances and taken maximum points, so now we want to get a run going and get maximum points.

“Hopefully the weather will be on our side for a change because the longer we lose games because of postponements, the more pressure it is going to put on everybody on and off the pitch.

“We’ve got 25 games to play in 16 weeks, and that’s before anymore are called off. So we’ve got about ten midweek games to come already.”

Victory in the final fixture of 2015 at leaders Blyth helped overcome some of the frustration suffered in recent weeks due to the number of postponements which have clearly interrupted Quakers’ campaign.

They have played fewer games than most clubs in the Evo-Stik Premier Division, but are fifth, nine points off Blyth, and after winning promotion seven months ago Gray is looking back on 2015 with satisfaction.

“It was a great end to the year, in terms of results, and a great year as a whole,” he said.

“We gained a promotion and have put ourselves in a great position to gain another promotion. That was always the plan and we’ve done that, so we had a good 2015.

“It’s been a great achievement from everybody. It’s easy to forget where we were three and a half years ago, trying to put a team together, to where we are now which is challenging for another promotion. It’s been exceptional from everyone.

“The support we’ve had, the players, the people that have fundraised for the club, they’ve all played a part. It’s great from a manager’s point of view that we’ve been able to keep the momentum going.

“We’ve all pulled together. I’ve played a part, but it’s about everybody chipping in and that team ethic is what sets us apart from everybody else.

“We’re hoping that 2016 will be just as successful and if it is we would be very happy.”

Darlington drew away to Ilkeston in September, a match that saw Chris Hunter sent off.

Ilkeston, ninth in the table, are looking for their first win in four league matches.

Andy Watson, Ilkeston manager, said of Darlington: “They are a very good side; we played some of our best football against them in the reverse fixture which ended 1-1. We both like to play along the floor, so it should make for an exciting game.

“They beat Blyth Spartans on Monday away from home which was a great result for them and they will want to build on that. But we arrive in reasonable confidence, we want to show what we can do and hopefully come away with what will be an impressive three points to get us back into the mix for the play-offs.”