Sittingbourne manager Nick Davis is thinking only about survival going into the new season.

Brickies start their Ryman League Division 1 South campaign with a difficult away game against Cray Wanderers on Saturday (3pm), followed by Three Bridges at home on Tuesday (7.45pm).

Davis said two months ago it would be an achievement to stay up – and nothing has changed his mind.

He said: “It would be great to improve on 18th place last season but the first thing is survival. I’m looking no further than that at the moment.

“The league is stronger and there’s a lot of money about so, first and foremost, we need to get enough points to stay up.

“We’ll see how long that takes but ideally I don’t want a stressful season.

“I know there will be ups and downs but I’m not setting any targets other than survival.

“On our day we’re a match for anyone but we’re a young side and we do have bad games where our heads go down.”

Brickies will be without new signing Danny Leonard for the first two weeks of the season.