DARLINGTON have the first of two fixtures with Spennymoor Town today and manager Alun Armstrong is likely to stick with the same team which overcame York City so impressively last Saturday.

The first 45 minutes were the team’s best of the season, playing some attacking football that had York on the backfoot and worthy of a lead bigger than the one created by Adam Campbell’s long-range goal on nine minutes.

There were no further goals in the second as a spirited York fought back, but Darlington stood firm, showing a different set of attributes to protect their lead against the division’s second-placed team.

Having also recently turned over Chester, fifth in the table, tenth-placed Darlington will fancy their chances of inflicting a first loss in 14 league games on Jason Ainsley’s side.

Quakers boss Alun Armstrong held a training session at 9am on Christmas Eve, and will consider changes as he has plenty of options to choose from, including goalkeeper Liam Connell who was unavailable at the weekend, but knows it would be risky to alter the starting XI.

“I’ve got to keep them ticking over and ask them to produce that again,” said Armstrong.

“You look at freshening it up, but would that be unfair on the lads that played at York? Maybe you change it for the game after Spennymoor.

“I was desperate to get Jack Lambert on because I thought he would retain the ball and get us up the pitch a little bit more, but who would you bring off?

“Wheatley and Will were fantastic, and Reidy was blowing a bit but his height in both boxes was important for us.

“It was harsh not to get Jack on, but I spoke to him after the game and he is still massively in my plans.”

New signing Sean Reid scored twice against Spennymoor last season for Blyth, and at York Armstrong gave him a debut with Omar Holness making way, while Justin Donawa returned to the bench with Jarrett Rivers recalled.

Holness had started 13 of their previous 14 games, and Armstrong explained: “Omar did exceptionally well at Solihull, but I took him out of the team just to get Reidy in the team. It was harsh on the lads who came out of the team, but they’ve got to believe that when they their chance comes again they’ve got to take it.

“I did think about starting Omar and bringing Reidy on. But I knew we were going to be short on height.

“I wanted Jarrett to start because I knew he could occupy David Ferguson, so Justin had to come out of the team, but if you take Justin out of team you haven’t got the height – he’s one of the best jumpers in the club. So to balance that out I had to get Sean in the team.”

While spirits are currently high, Armstrong is aware Quakers are from the finished article - it’s not long since his team lost successive league matches to Leamington, Telford and Brackley.

Most of the team’s better performances this season have come away from home, and the manager admitted: “You’ve got reign it in a bit. We are what we are at this moment in time, we cannot get too excited because it’s not long ago we got beat 3-0 off Leamington and 5-1 at Brackley.

“So there’s still a lot to fix, but the lads are performing and when you go on a run you’ve got to enjoy it and use that confidence.

“Chester at home we were first class in the first half, then backs to the wall second half. Against Telford at home we were cruising but second half was probably one of the worst performances of the season. Bradford Park Avenue at home was the worst performance of the season.

“We are winning games at home but if we could take that form from York to Blackwell to show the fans what we can do I’m sure the crowds would build.”

Armstrong’s Blyth team drew 2-2 twice with Spennymoor over Christmas last season, while Darlington also drew 2-2 at Town in August 2018.

However, Spennymoor won 2-1 at Darlington in January, and Armstrong added: “It’s a derby at home in front of our fans and I think we owe Spennymoor one after the last time at Blackwell.”