JON Macken feels his Witton Albion players are showing the values that mean their rise up the table will not become derailed by their sequence of wins ending at the weekend.

Albion drew 2-2 at home to Bootle on Saturday, the first time they have lost points in five matches.

However, it remains an unbeaten start to 2024 that has seen them climb to sixth place in Northern Premier League West, putting them on the brink of the play-offs places ahead of this Saturday’s visit to lowly Nantwich Town.

They were a little ‘off their game’ against a Bootle side that were leading 2-1 and doing all the pressing but Macken’s men found a way to seal a point.

“We’ve got ourselves in a good position, we’re still unbeaten which is a big thing,” said the Witton manager.

“It’s what we wanted to do. We went behind 2-1 and to show the character to come from behind and get the equaliser, I think that’s what we’re about now and that’s what we want to show.

“It shows the character and belief in what we’re trying to generate at the football club.

“I think for us it was a good point.

“With Bootle, there was a big reaction from their previous result and that’s what you want to see from your team.

“I thought Bootle played really well. They made it hard for us, they worked really hard, they were pressing us and I think we were a little bit off it if I’m perfectly honest.

“I don’t think we could just get a foothold in the game.

Northwich Guardian:

“We got our goal and maybe it was questionable whether we should have had another penalty straight after but we had some big chances in that first half and you’ve got to take them. And we didn’t.

“For me, in the second half we were making poor decisions all over the park, not really what we’ve seen.

“So it’s one of them games where you look back and think to yourself ‘I’ll take a point out of that’, especially the way it was going in the second half.

“They were putting a lot of pressure on and were winning a lot of second and third balls and so all in all I think we’ve had a really good couple of weeks with games and results and this was a little bit of an indifferent game for us but we know we’ll get better and I don’t want to take anything away from Bootle because I thought they played really well.

“There could have been a bit of tiredness for us and it probably was because you can see from some of the decisions, some of our recovery runs when we gave the ball away it wasn’t as sharp and energetic as we'd quite like.

“But we’ve shown a lot of resilience and character and Benny Harrison’s got us a goal as the equaliser.

“Obviously we want to win every game, especially at home, but I’m pleased with a point.”