Canterbury coach Andy Pratt is desperate to keep his side’s feet on the ground despite them ending their run of four straight National 2 South defeats with their victory over Shelford at Merton Lane on Saturday.

After their only previous win this season on September 13, Canterbury went on a four-game skid and with games against two of the league’s top-three to follow in the following fortnight, Pratt doesn’t want his troops to take rock-bottom Dings Crusaders lightly this Saturday.

He said: “The level of execution was much better against Shelford, but we are still not quite where we’d want to be.

“We have still got a long way to go and what’s for sure is that we cannot afford to go down to Dings and be anything other than mentally right, as it’s a very tough place to go and I have got great respect for them.

“You can’t take any notice of the table as yet, I think Bournemouth were top at this point last year and they ended up going down.”

Pratt hinted that his side – in a pack of four tied for third-bottom – might have lost focus after overcoming Old Elthamians at Merton Lane last month, resulting in a stinging defeat at Worthing seven days later.

He said: “I don’t think we were right mentally when we went down to Worthing for the start of what was always going to be a very difficult run. I think the win over Old Elthamians maybe had something to do with it. I am wary about that happening again.”

He added: “We want to keep the progress going and we want to get our performance right.”