THINGS are looking rosy for 1874 Northwich.

They sit proudly atop the North West Counties League Premier Division table, four points clear of second-place Longridge Town.

That, plus their run of three consecutive victories, will have them high in confidence going into a tough weekend schedule – they welcome Ashton Athletic to Townfield on Saturday, kick off 3pm, before a trip to Whitchurch Alport on Monday evening, kick off 7.45pm.

Hopes are building that this could be their year for promotion, but feet remain on the ground within the squad.

“We’re not getting carried away whatsoever,” co-manager Wayne Goodison says.

“I know it sounds a bit cliché, but we’re not even halfway through the season yet.

“There’s still plenty of games to play and I’m sure there will be plenty of twists and turns to come.

“We wanted a good start and we’ve had that, now we’ll see where we are after the next 10 games or so.

“We’ve seen it so many times before – teams will be up there at the halfway point and end up dropping away.

“I hope that’s not the case for us, but we’ve just got to stay focused on what we’re doing.

“It’s about performances for us and we know that if we keep performing like we are doing, we’ll be competitive.

“We’ve got a tough weekend coming up with two quick games. We said we’d see where we were after 10 games and now we’ll do the same after 20.

“We’re not going to look too far ahead, only at what’s in front of us.”

Goals have been easy to come by for 1874 with a league-high 43 scored in 14.

However, they have been proficient at the other end as well and boast the division’s best defensive record having conceded only 14 times.

“We did a lot of work in the summer on our defence,” said Goodison, who picks the team alongside co-boss Paul Bowyer.

“We’ve always known we have players than can score goals if we can create the chances for them, but we’ve worked hard on the other end.

“The players have taken that on and have bought into what Paul and I decided we wanted to do.

“I’m sure we’ll have a spell where we’ll concede a few because that’s football, but they look like they’re enjoying keeping clean sheets at the moments.

“There’s a real determination about them to not concede.

“That’s got to be our foundation – if we do enough things right at the back we know we’ll create enough going the other way to score goals.”

1874 hope to have Lee Jackson available for this weekend after he missed Saturday’s 2-0 win at Burscough with flu.

Taylor Kennerley (knee) is close to a return while Jack Pritchard and Ryan Jackson remain long-term absentees.