John Embery has played down a suggestion that Herne Bay are the Jekyll and Hyde team of Bostik South East.

Bay have spent much of the season struggling at the wrong end of the table but have also produced several eye-catching results.

The most recent was Saturday’s 2-1 success against Ashford at Winch’s Field – a result which ended a six-match winning streak for the visitors, who began the day in second.

Bay’s two other home league wins this season have come against play-off hopefuls Hastings (4-1) and Hythe (3-1), but joint boss Embery believes his side are a match for anyone – when they have their full strength squad available.

He explained: “Someone said to me the other day ‘You’re like Jekyll and Hyde’, and I suppose we are a little bit but it’s more about keeping players on the pitch.

“We’ve probably got a group of 14 and when we have them all available it makes a massive difference but when you get injuries, it stretches it to a point where it becomes hard.

“On Saturday we had a very good starting XI and that helps.

“We’ve always been capable of scoring goals, I honestly believe that when we can put our full side out we’re a match for anyone.”

Bay remain in the bottom two but the lower half of the table is so congested that victory away to Three Bridges on Saturday could move them up several places.

Embery said: “It’s tight from 10th place down (Sevenoaks in 10th have 33 points, while Bay are on 23 from a game less).

“If we win on Saturday then we’ll only be a point behind Three Bridges and they are 13th.”

Embery was delighted with his team’s display against Ashford and felt they deserved the win, despite Bay keeper Simon Overland having to make some fine saves, particularly early on.

He added: “It was a good game, our keeper made some good saves at critical times but we bullied their back four and they couldn’t cope with our running off the ball.

“We showed effort, desire and a determination to win the ball, there wasn’t a bad performance, they just need to keeping doing that on a more consistent basis.”