Steve Lovell fears for his players’ fitness levels as the club’s fixture congestion begins to take its toll.

The wet weather on Monday night caused Ashford’s relegation scrap against Whitstable to be postponed for the sixth time and manager Lovell has cancelled training due to the daunting run of fixtures from now until the end of the season.

Ashford are due to face form-side Leatherhead on Saturday before travelling to Ramsgate on Monday and Lovell (pictured) said: "It’s hard to keep the players fit with so many games coming around and one or two were glad that Monday’s game was off as that allowed them time to recover from knocks.

"We stopped training last week to give the boys a break in between games.

"We’ve got games Monday, Wednesday, Saturday now and it’s hard getting 11 players out to perform.

"The squads at our level are not big and with just 16, 17 players to pick from they’re all going to be needed."

Lovell is not concerned about his players missing practice sessions as they are getting more than enough action during a hectic Ryman League Division 1 South run-in.

He said: "On the day of the games we can make them aware of what they should do and we’ve done enough with them to understand what is required. The main thing is the fitness. Training won’t help that at this stage of the season."