United winger Terry Hawkridge is geared up and looking forward to another top-of-the-table clash against Burton Albion.
Hawkridge played his first full 90 minutes of football since the goalless draw with Fleetwood Town at the end of January in the 2-0 win over Plymouth last weekend, with the 24 year old keen to continue that while more importantly picking up three points against the Brewers.“Obviously it’s going to be another tough game,” he told The Iron Player.
“They’re in fifth position and four points behind us, but I think as long as we keep playing and keep doing what we did on Saturday at Plymouth, we will be fine.”
He added: “We have been working hard this week to take everything out of what we did at Plymouth and hopefully we can put that into the performance this Saturday.”
Briefly reflecting on the 21 unbeaten games, the Scunthorpe midfielder is the level of performance shown in the game at Home Park can be replicated for the final nine games of the season.
“It’s 21 unbeaten going into the 22nd game on Saturday,” he continued.
“No game is easy, but as long as we keep playing our game and working together as a team, we will be okay.”
He added: “We’ve had a good week training in preparation for the game, so hopefully we can pick up the points in what will be a tough game on Saturday.”
A win for the Iron will see them extend the gap between the two sides to seven points and while that result will alleviate the pressure on the side, Hawkridge insists there will still be eight highly important games left following the conclusion of the fixture.
“It would be great to make that gap seven points,” said Hawkridge.
“It would take a bit of pressure off the top three, but we have to concentrate our game and let them play theirs. We’re doing really well at the moment, we’re playing well and we’re playing good football and everyone is happy at the moment.
“We’ve got to carry on even if we do win on Saturday, a win won’t get us promoted. It’ll give us more freedom, but we can’t take our foot off the gas until we’ve played 46 league games.”
He added: “We want the top spot, so three points will bring us three points closer to the top of the division. It will be great to win, but we’ve got to keep going.”
On the flip side, a first defeat under manager Russ Wilcox will open up the automatic promotion places, with the gap reduced to just one point. In either case, the Scunthorpe midfielder insists that full focus will be placed on earning three points in the next game.
He said: “Burton will definitely come to win the game and they’ll come to try and take us off the unbeaten record which all the teams we’ve got to play will keep time. We’ve got to keep trying to extend that record while picking up three points.
“It will be pressure on if they reduce the deficit to a point. Like I said though, as long as we perform and play to what we know we’re capable of, we will be fine.”
He added: “Hopefully we can get the first goal and put the pressure on them.”
United get underway at 3pm on Saturday against Burton Albion in the first of three fixtures in eight days. While the importance of the week is evident, Hawkridge insists he and the team will be taking it one match at a time.
“It’s going to be really important,” he said.
“We’ve got to take each game as it comes. Saturday’s game come first and then after that game we will turn our attentions to another big game away from home at Cheltenham.”
He added: “Obviously the last nine games of the season are going to be massively important, so we will take each one of those as they come.”
See much more from Terry Hawkridge, Russ Wilcox and Sam Slocombe on The Iron Player.