Romford are just one point off of manager Paul Martin’s 20-point target before Christmas.

Romford manager Paul Martin admits his men face their toughest tests of the season over the next few weeks, commencing with tomorrow’s (Saturday’s) visit of high-flying Potters Bar Town.

Incredibly, Romford have played only one of the seven sides currently above them in the table – when they lost 3-1 at Thamesmead Town back in August.

Potters Bar arrive at Ship Lane sitting in third place, while games against leaders Maldon & Tiptree and fifth-placed Heybridge Swifts follow later this month.

And Martin believes he will have a much better idea of his side’s capabilities once those games are out of the way.

Martin said: “We come up against several of the top teams in the next few weeks and so that will be the real test for us.

“We’re going to have to battle to take points off these sides.

“But we generally tend to do well against the better sides and sometimes drop points against the lesser teams, so hopefully we can get some good results.

Romford currently have 19 points to their name and are well ahead of schedule to secure the 20 points demanded by their boss before Christmas.

Martin remains a realist given his club’s limited resources and is taking nothing for granted.

He said: “We always set a target of 20 points by Christmas and 40 for the season.

“We still need one league point to reach our target for Christmas and that single point could be hard to get.

“Everyone knows that for a club without a budget and with no stadium, it’s a good season for us if we avoid relegation.

“But we always try to improve on our previous points tally and we got 57 last year so that’s not going to be easy.