Boss salutes players for survival effort

Joint Peterborough Sports manager Michael Gash has saluted his players after the club confirmed their National League North status for another season over the weekend.

It was going to take a highly unlikely set of results for Sports to get sucked into the relegation dogfight anyway, but a point from a goalless draw at Banbury United on Easter Monday made safety a mathematical certainty.

And, although the club have flirted with the play-offs at times this season, survival was always the main objective in the first campaign at step two level in their history.

Sports were beaten 2-1 at home by play-off chasers at Alfreton Town on Saturday, but sit 13th in the table with three games to go ahead of a home game with Hereford United on Saturday (3pm).

And then Sports could pick up some silverware as they will be hot favourites to defend their Northants FA Hillier Cup trophy in Tuesday’s final against Cogenhoe United at Northampton Town FC (7.45pm).

"It’s been a big effort from the players and the staff,” Gash enthused. “it’s been hard work at times against some pretty big clubs for the level, but to achieve safety so comfortably is a tremendous achievement from everyone.

"The club has travelled a long way in a short space of time and this season was obviously the biggest challenge of them all, but we passed the test.

"It shows how far we’ve come that we were disappointed not to win both games over Easter.

"We were the better team in both matches, but we couldn’t kill Alfreton off after taking the lead and we should have been capable of winning at Banbury.

"And this Saturday we will hope to beat a club as big as Hereford United for the second time this season.

"There’s also some chance of some silverware on Tuesday. We will be as strong as we can be in a match we will be expected to win, but we also have to acknowledge how well Cogenhoe did in beating Kettering in a semi-final.

"We won’t be taking them lightly and winning a cup would cap an excellent season.”

**Sports still have to pass a ground inspection on April 30 to ensure survival at National League level.