Huw Griffiths salutes brilliant atmosphere at Cefn Druids

Those are the words of manager Huw Griffiths, who has been pleasantly surprised by morale of his players as they scrap it out in ninth place.

The Ancients have gone from Europa League qualifiers to looking over their shoulder at the relegation zone, but Griffiths believes that the spirit in the camp is as high as ever.

“The atmosphere is brilliant,” he declared. “The lads have been great...they’ve been genuinely brilliant. I can’t believe the atmosphere is as good as it is, although we aren’t a million miles off finding our best form.”

For Druids to find top form and make a late play for the top six, Griffiths knows his side must be better going forward.

Griffiths was frustrated as Druids played out a goalless draw at Llandudno last week, which followed on from a goal a game in each of the previous five outings.

He continued: “We’ve got to do better going forward. We have not been heavily beaten by anybody, but we aren’t scoring enough goals.

“We need to do more going forward. At the moment we are a little bit shot-shy, we’ve got to pull the trigger more when the chances present themselves.”

Next up for Druids is a home clash against Newtown tonight, Chris Hughes’ visitors currently flying high in fourth place.

Griffiths knows his side have their work cut out to end a three-game winless run.

“They are flying at the moment,” said Griffiths. “They have got on a roll and it’s easy to see why. They are a mobile, athletic and big side.

“We’ve got to match them physically. I don’t mean that they are aggressive, but they are tall and we’ve got to stand up to that.”

Neil Ashton could return to Druids after he missed last week’s draw with Llandudno through injury, while Newtown could be tempted to go with the same XI that drew 1-1 with reigning champions The New Saints.

Robins boss Hughes wants to see his side “kick-on” after they put themselves in a good position to qualify for the top six, but he knows Druids will put up a fight.

On the trip to Druids, Hughes said: “They got into Europe last year, they massively overachieved.

“I’m sure they will want to get their season back on track.

“We want to make sure we go to Druids, put a performance on and win the game.”

Bala Town are out to end an otherwise disappointing week on a high with three points against Cardiff Met tomorrow.

Colin Caton’s Lakesiders went into the last seven days unbeaten at Maes Tegid, but that run was ended in a 1-0 loss to Barry Town United.

Bala followed that up by exiting the League Cup at the quarter-final stage as visiting Connah’s Quay Nomads secured a late winner through Andy Owens.

And now Christian Edwards’ Cardiff Met head to Maes Tegid looking to make it a week to forget to Bala.

But coach Stephen Fisher knows there is enough quality in the Bala squad to return to winning ways in-front of the television cameras.

Fisher said: “They will be a well-organised, well-structured side, who will work and fight for each other, but on our day we can beat anybody.”

Carmarthen and visiting Caernarfon go head-to-head tomorrow with both sides looking to end frustrating sequences of results.

Hosts Carmarthen have failed to win since beating Newtown 3-0 on September 8, while Caernarfon have gone five games without victory, the Canaries without a goal in the last three.

Caernarfon boss Sean Eardley is confident he has the squad of players to end that run and re-ignite their top six hopes, saying: “I can look over my shoulder and I’ve got players I can rely on to play at Carmarthen.”

Carmarthen are fighting for top-flight survival after picking up just nine points from the opening 12 matches.

But with Llandudno only ahead of the Old Gold on goal difference, boss Neil Smothers remains optimistic.

“If you look outside the top two everyone is pretty much beating everyone and the league is changing constantly,” said Smothers. “It’s been quite useful for us that there are no huge gaps between us and the teams around us.

“If you can put a good run together you can climb quite quickly.”