Manager Matt Clements believes St Neots Town are emerging from the toughest spell of his reign.

The local club climbed out of the Southern League Premier Division Central relegation zone with a 3-1 victory against Redditch last Saturday.

And Clements reckons the long awaited triumph at the Premier Plus Stadium – just a second league victory on home turf all season – proves his men can climb the standings.

Clements said: “I had to make some difficult decisions to try to put things right and everyone saw on Saturday that process is well under way.

“I take responsibility for what has been a difficult spell for us . . . by far the toughest of my time as manager of this club.

“We stayed up in 2016/17 and then progressed well last season to finish in mid-table and win a county cup.

“The opening few months of this season have not gone to plan, but there were signs against Stourbridge the previous Saturday that our fortunes were turning and that continued by beating Redditch.

“Now the challenge is to try to put a run of positive results together. We’ve got a run of games that look quite favourable on paper and we have to take advantage of that.

“If we replicate the performance of last Saturday we will have a good chance of picking up points.

“I’ve said many times we have a core group of players who have been terrific and we have added to that in recent weeks.

“Those players have come in for plenty of grief from certain quarters, but they deserve praise for sticking together.”

Nabil Shariff struck twice with Dylan Williams also on target as Saints beat Redditch to earn three precious points. Saints are without a fixture tomorrow but travel to Barwell on Tuesday for a re-arranged Premier Division Central clash. And they won’t be short of motivation against the Leicestershire side who knocked them out of the FA Trophy last month despite playing with 10 men for more than an hour.

* There is a big derby fixture at the Premier Plus Stadium tomorrow as St Neots Town Reserves host Eaton Socon in the Cambridgeshire County League. It’s a 3pm kick-off with free admission