STEVE Claridge believes Salisbury must continue their good run of form to stand any chance of a top five finish.

The head coach has engineered back-to-back league wins over Bishops Cleeve and Shortwood United.

The six point-haul takes them to within five points of the play-offs, behind fifth-placed Swindon Supermarine.

And with the halfway point in the campaign reached, Claridge says his charges need to push on if they are to stay with the leading pack.

“We know if we don’t put six or seven wins on the bounce, we are simply not going to get anywhere,” Claridge told JournalSport.

“I’ve looked at the fixtures for the next three or four months and everybody has to play each other.

“We’ve done Taunton, Taunton will be in the play-offs, we’ve done Evesham, Evesham will be play-offs and we’ve gone to Hereford. So we are looking at the games we’ve got ahead of us and Tiverton away, undoubtedly, will be a really tough game and then every other game we’ve got to look at and go right, it’s a game we’ve got to be trying to win.

“We don’t play the top five again for quite a while.

“We’re seven points behind fourth place, which is Mangotsfield, so you cannot just say you will take one out of it.”

Saturday’s 1-0 win over Shortwood recorded back-to-back clean sheets in the league all season.

Lewis Benson found the winner in the 25th minute with a delightful strike.

“It was a grind,” an exhausted Claridge added.

“Bassy’s pulled off two great saves and we’ve missed chance after chance after chance and you think it’s going to be another one of those days, and we’ve had plenty of those this year, but thankfully it wasn’t. I’ll take that all day long.”

The team celebrated afterwards at their Christmas party in Bournemouth.