Ashford United face a big run of home games - and will hope to make them count.

Six of their next eight matches are at The Green Box Stadium, including the next two.

Craig Stone’s team take on Steyning Town at home in Isthmian South East on Saturday and welcome Broadbridge Heath on Tuesday.

Margate, South Park, Crowborough and Sheppey are also all heading to Ashford before the end of November.

Stone said: “We don’t travel too badly on the whole, but it’s still better to be at home. It’s better to be in front of our fans and try and build on what we’ve currently done, which is looking to make it a fortress, a really tough place to come. I think we’ve done that now.

“Apart from obviously Hastings (a 3-1 defeat) when we ended up with a man sent off and a little bit of a mad moment, we’ve done really well at home.

“We like our pitch, we like our home ground and it suits the way we play. It’s a tough place to come to.

“It’s a massive pitch and teams can find it really difficult in terms of the size of it.

“It’s always good to have your home fans, and hopefully we can look at sort of building the size of the crowd coming along as well - that obviously comes from results.

“It’s six out of the next eight games at home and if we can keep making it a fortress then we’ll be in a really good position once we’ve finished all the home games because you should be looking to win your home games.”

The Nuts & Bolts were away against Herne Bay on Tuesday night, losing 1-0.

That followed last Saturday’s 4-1 win at Peacehaven & Telscombe.

Gary Lockyer scored the first of two goals early in the second half and Oli Bate also netted before the home side got one back at a blustery Window Workshop Stadium. Kareem Isaka came off the bench and scored Ashford’s fourth in stoppage time.

Stone’s side have managed to gradually climb the Isthmian South East table. They’ve been doing it with a slender squad and the manager is keeping a close eye on player availability in case he needs to bring others in to help.

He said: “I’ve been fairly pleased with the performances from the boys. We’re doing okay and we’re in the mix at the moment and in a fairly decent place. We always want more, we always want better, but it’s fairly early days, still.

“We keep our heads down. We’re not getting too carried away. Things can turn around quickly, as we’ve already seen.

“We’ve gone from potentially being fourth bottom at half-time in the Sevenoaks game, which we then go on to win, we draw against Horley, win the next two, and we’re sitting seventh. So that’s how it can quickly turn around in just a couple of weeks.

“It quickly turns around in football, especially at this early stage. We’re just going to keep going game by game.

The defeat at Herne Bay came just a week after the home fixture, which they won 1-0 thanks to Sam Hasler’s goal.

Talking about his injury issues, Stone said: “When you have so many games, you get niggles in the group and it’s about managing that. We haven’t got a massive squad.

“We’ve got Will Moses coming back, and he’s not so far away. But he’s the only one. The schedule makes it really challenging and does make it hard on the players.

“I do like a smaller squad, to a degree, but also I’ve got to be aware of injuries.

“Michael West got a slight injury, so he’s probably a week or two away. We’ll see how Jamie Maskell picked up an injury against Peacehaven. It can almost lead you to bringing people in but we’ll see how it goes.

“We’ll see how those injuries are, see how long-term they are. Because ultimately I’m really pleased with the squad.

“I’m really happy with the lads that we’ve got in but it might be a case that if we do, it would only be one or two just to strengthen and just to give us probably an extra little bit of cover.”

Young Gills striker Zach Whitelock recently left after a successful loan spell and Stone is on the ball when it comes to any young talent needing a place to play.

With a son playing for Gillingham’s youth team, he can watch games with a second motive and was there on Tuesday afternoon to catch the under-18 fixture between Charlton and the Gills.

“I’m always looking,” he said. “But it’s got to be the right fit and the right timing.

“For me it would have to be someone that needs to come in and really push to be in the starting XI and it all depends on the injuries in the next couple of games.”