Striker Paul Jones should be available for the trip to Eastbourne after recovering from a groin strain

Ashford Town travel to Eastbourne Town on Saturday for what promises to be a real ‘dog eats dog’ relegation battle.

The sides occupy the bottom two positions in Ryman League Division 1 South and, although neither manager would be prepared to admit it, defeat this weekend would count as a massive blow to their survival chances.

While Eastbourne were losing 3-0 at Croydon Athletic last Saturday, Ashford were battling to a 2-2 draw at Whyteleafe despite having to play with 10 men for most of the second half following the dismissal of Nick Smith.

Manager Steve Lovell said: "It was a good performance and we should have won and we would have done if Nick hadn’t been sent-off.

"His first yellow was for a silly offence and he then paid the price when he was given another yellow early in the second half. It put a bit of a dampener on things."

But Lovell was encouraged by a number of other aspects in Saturday’s game, adding: "I thought Tom Murphy again did well.

"He worked hard, especially when he was left up front on his own after we reorganised the team when Nick was sent off and our back three of Danny Lye, Laurence Harvey and Lee Hockey were excellent."

Lovell was hoping to have a near full-strength squad to pick from against Eastbourne.

Paul Jones (groin) and Carl Harrold (knee) should both be available while Ryan Norman (knee) was due to have a run-out in the reserve team at Ramsgate last night. Lovell added: "If Ryan comes through that okay then he will be in contention for Eastbourne as well and it’s nice to have a near full-strength squad available again.

He said: "We know that we are in for a long slog to the end of the season if we want to keep ourselves in this division but I believe that we have enough talent at the club to do that."