PETERSFIELD Town have renewed their efforts to spark the start of what would be a great escape from relegation.

Extra training sessions have been set up as the players increase their work rates ahead of what will need to be a crucial part of the season if the Rams are to make what seems at the moment to be an improbable escape from the drop zone.

They currently find themselves nine points adrift at the bottom of Division 1 Central and 14 points adrift of third from bottom Aylesbury with 16 games remaining.

However, spirits remain high in the Petersfield camp and there is belief in the squad that they can pull themselves out of trouble – starting with their trip to Beaconsfield SYCOB on Saturday.

The task on paper doesn’t look an impossible mountain to climb at the moment – ten wins out of 16 would put them on 39 points and that usually ensures teams have enough points to stay up.

But when you take into account that Petersfield have claimed just nine points from 26 matches so far this season it then shows the dramatic improvement in form they need to find to get out of trouble.

“We’ve almost reached the point now where you are going to have to get points from every game to stay up,” said Rams chairman Graeme Moir.

“Ten wins is still the target – seven or eight might do it but that depends on what the other sides in the bottom half of the table do. We could certainly do with a few of them having bad runs so it keeps more of them looking over their shoulders.

“However, as I regularly tell people the points gap and how big it is doesn’t really matter at the moment – until we start picking up some points it won’t come into play in terms of the relegation battle in the division.”

Moir believes his club could learn a lesson or two from the resurgence Beaconsfield have found in recent months as after a poor start to the season they now find themselves in 13th place and well out of relegation trouble.

Moir added: “Beaconsfield were down with us for the first month or two of the season but they brought a couple of new players in and they have really made a difference for them.

“Our manager John Robson is working on one or two new faces to come in which he feels can make the difference for us and the extra training the lads are putting in can only help the situation.

“We have been competitive throughout the season but what we need to bring to our game is that extra couple of per cent to get us into winning positions that we have been lacking.

“Everyone is working hard to turn our situation around – we just need to experience that winning feeling again and then with a couple of results on the board things will look a lot different and it would bring us some momentum for the first time.”