by Kevin Redsull

Hythe Town manager Scott Porter is adamant his side can remain on course to achieve their target of reaching this season’s Ryman League, Division 1 South play-offs.

Last Saturday’s 3-2 defeat at Tooting & Mitcham – their third league defeat in a row – saw Hythe drop out of the play-off positions for the first time since the end of October.

But Porter insisted: "Every team has a blip and we are having ours now but I have got every faith in this group of players that they will turn things around and we will make the play-offs, which was always our aim this season."

Hythe are at home to lowly Corinthian-Casuals on Saturday in a fixture which would seem to offer Porter’s side the perfect chance to get their season moving in the right direction again, especially as Craig Cloke looks set to return to central defence after his recent absence due to a groin injury.

Skipper Dave Cook dropped back to centre-half to plug the gap at Tooting but Porter admitted it wasn’t the ideal solution.

The Hythe boss said: "Playing Dave (Cook) at centre-half means you are taking him away from his favourite position in midfield but with Clokey hopefully back on Saturday, Dave will be able to move back there and that should make us a bit more organised."

"We didn’t deserve to lose any of those games against Faversham, Maidstone and at Tooting and you only had to look at the boys’ faces in the dressing room on Saturday to see how disappointed they were."