MARTIN GRAY today enters his third century of games as manager when Darlington welcome Boston United to Heritage Park for their first home game of the season.

The opening-day 2-2 draw seven days ago at Altrincham was Gray’s 200th fixture since becoming Quakers’ boss four years ago, and he has led the club through four exciting seasons.

Their finishing positions have been first, second, second and first, with three promotions achieved and two league titles.

“I’m very proud of that,” said Gray, when told about reaching the 200 landmark.

“You don’t realise how many games you’ve done, you just go from week to week and never look any further than that.”

Reaching his double century leaves Gray just behind two previous Darlington managers Eddie Carr (204) and Cyril Knowles (209), although he still has some way to top David Hodgson's 359.

Asked where he would like to be here in another 200 games time, Gray said: “I hope I’m still Darlington manager.

“My target was to get the club back to where they were, and I’ve done that because the club was going to be relegated into the Conference North before being relegated into the Northern League in 2012.”

Only Gary Brown, Leon Scott and Amar Purewal all played Gray’s first game at the helm – a 3-1 win over landlords Bishop Auckland on August 18, 2012 – and all three started last Saturday’s fixture.

Newly-promoted Quakers twice fought back from going a goal down, Terry Galbraith’s injury-time penalty earning a point against a club relegated last season.

“The management team played a massive part,” said Gray.

“We changed formation to get back into the game, the players took it on board, as did the subs who came on.

“It should have been a win, in my opinion.

“You can see the difference in standard, of course, you have to expect it.

“But I thought we held our own against them and overall they weren’t a lot better at all.”

Altrincham took the lead in the first half when James Lawrie headed home after making an unchecked run into Quakers’ penalty area, a goal which frustrated Gray.

“We were disappointed with that one because it was a really soft goal to concede. Someone didn’t do their job,” he said.

“You pay for your mistakes more the higher you go up, that’s just common sense.

“The higher you go the better the forwards are, the crosses into the box have better quality, so you can’t afford to let your concentration levels drop.

“We’ll learn and get better as we go along.”

Brown and Scott are expected to play today, although Purewal’s place is under threat due to Mark Beck being available after receiving international clearance, while Stephen Thompson is in the squad after missing the match a week ago due to being on holiday.

He has played in 175 of Gray’s 200 matches, more than anyone else, and knows his manger will be aiming for another promotion this season, but admits it will be a challenge.

“You’ve got to set your standards high so you’ve got to look for promotion and if you speak to Martin he would never accept anything less,” said Thompson. We’ll go for it but it’s going to be tough.

“The last few years have been baby steps, but this will be the biggest test yet.

“People might’ve thought last year was a big step, it probably was, but we were up to the challenge.

“This year there will be teams that can pass the ball and keep it well, we’re going to have to break them down.

“But it might work the other way in that teams might come to us and not always defend.

“It’s going to be a completely different season.”