Derek Hares feels Deal Town are entering the defining period in their season.

The Hoops start the new year eighth in Southern Counties East after a 3-0 win at Canterbury last weekend.

That’s the highest position they’ve occupied all season and they want to build on that at title contenders Corinthian this Saturday.

Town host Hellenic League Binfield in the FA Vase fourth round a week later, followed by a midweek home tie against Bearsted in the Challenge Cup.

Manager Hares said: “We’ve got a really big two weeks coming up.

“Corinthian, the FA Vase and the Challenge Cup are three big games and, looking at it, I think these two weeks will define our season.

“Everyone’s starting to think about the Vase but we’ve got an important game at Corinthian to focus on first and then we can look at Binfield.”

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Ben Cardwell is rated 50-50 to face Corinthian after aggravating a hamstring injury against Canterbury, while Alfie Foster serves a one-game ban after his second-half red card.

Hares said: “It’s always difficult at Corinthian but if we perform like we can, I’m sure we’ll give a good account of ourselves.

“They’re always up there and they’re a good footballing side, particularly at home.

“I think they’ve beaten us there the last few times but probably in two or three of the last four games we’ve had someone sent off so it’s important we keep our discipline.

“We’re up to eighth and we’d like to go higher than that if we can. There’s still a lot of games to go.

“The three or four at the top will be very difficult to catch but there’s still a few teams around us.”

Hares was impressed with Deal’s professionalism at Canterbury, facing a young team thrown together in a week following the mass walk-out of boss Clive Cook and his squad.

Town got the job done on a potentially tricky afternoon.

Hares said: “It was a strange game. Canterbury were very enthusiastic and they worked hard.

“They’d managed to get a few experienced players back in but it was a team playing together for the first time.

“We were going into the unknown, and it wasn’t an easy game, but I thought we handled it really well.

“They had one good chance at the start of the second half but we were comfortable winners.”

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