HAVING beaten Blyth and Bradford in the last two weeks, Brackley Town are Darlington’s opponents today, another team at the top end of the table, though Quakers will not be intimated given their own upturn in form.

Confidence is high as the team are unbeaten in five matches, winning three in a row for the first time since August, a 3-2 success at lowly Leamington starting the winning sequence.

Both Blyth and Bradford occupied a play-off position at the time of Darlington’s wins, but Brackley boast some impressive statistics of their own.

The third-placed team have not lost at home since March, winning ten and drawing four of their league fixtures at their St James’ Park home.

“They’ve got the best home record in the division, they’re a team that is doing really well, they’re a well-organised, big, strong team,” admitted Quakers assistant boss Alan White.

“So it’s going to be a tough game, but in recent weeks we’ve hit upon a winning formula.

“We’ve tried different things and we’ve found this formula which seems to work.

“If we’re at it and we’re playing well, and the lads are playing with confidence, that freedom that we’ve been encouraging them to play with, there’s no reason we can’t give Brackley a good game and a good test.

“We’re not afraid of them, we’re not worried about them in particular, we just want to go down there and put in a good performance.

“If we do what we know we can do then we’ve got a really good chance of getting a result.”

Quakers can take encouragement from Tamworth, Telford, Leamington and Curzon – all below them in the table – having this season drawn at Brackley.

However, if they are to produce a positive result they must do so without the suspended Stephen Thompson, who has been in top form in recent weeks, scoring a hat-trick in the win at Leamington.

Hopes that James Caton could replace him in the starting line-up are thin, with White explaining: “We’re not sure about Cates. He injured his hamstring last time he played and it’s a little bit worse than we thought.”

Thompson has been a key player lately, and his absence is all the more frustrating for Darlington given the nature of his dismissal seven days ago.

The first of his two bookings was extremely harsh, cautioned for an accidental collision with Bradford’s Javan Vidal, and referee David Underwood also booked him later on for simulation.

Darlington held on to win 1-0, making it two away wins in a row for the first time since August 2016, but White admitted: “It’s a blow to lose Thommo, especially in the circumstances. He has been an almost ever-present, he has been fantastic for us, but then gets two yellow cards for nonsense decisions.

“The referee even apologised for the first yellow card, which I have never heard of before, and the ridiculous thing is we can’t do anything about it because you can’t appeal yellow cards.

“The second one, yeah he went down, but he got straight back up again and carried on. He didn’t make a big deal of it, there was no need for the referee to take action.

“I’ve been saying for a lot of years, the trouble with refereeing and the laws of the game now is that they’re trying to make it too black and white, but football isn’t like that, there are grey areas.

“There’s times when you’ve got to show a bit of common sense, a bit of experience, a little bit of discretion. But there isn’t room for that with the laws now, everything is black and white.

“I feel sorry for referees because they don’t know whether they’re coming or going.

“Every week we have a referee who will interpret the laws in different ways, which creates grey areas.

“But for a referee to apologise for giving a yellow card, but there’s no form of appeal or way to rescind it, is incredible.

“It is part and parcel of football, you’ve got to deal with it and we’ve got players who can come in and fill that gap.”

Darlington are now 14th, Tommy Wright and White overseeing a renaissance after a poor run of results at the beginning of their tenure, their first game in November at Blackwell Meadows being a 3-0 loss to Brackley.