'We have to be at our best'' - Crawley Town boss ready for 'really strong' Mansfield Town challenge

Mansfield have had a tremendous season so far, which has left them lying in fourth place, one point behind Barrow and Wrexham in those automatic promotion places. Adding to that, Mansfield have not played for 17 days as their game last week was postponed, likely leaving them fresh and replenished.

Lindsey was full of praise for The Stags, saying: “Really good players and good manager, he is a very experienced manager (Nigel Clough). “They have some really good players, Aidan Flint had an unbelievable career, played a lot of football in the championship, he’s above the level, even now.

“Louis Reed in midfield, good player, George Maris, good player - they have good players all across the pitch. They have a way of playing where they have an understanding of each other, and they are aggressive with it.

“Tough game against a really strong side. We have to be at our best, they are (one of the best teams in the league).”

SEE ALSO Crawley Town boss praises 'professional performance' as Reds pick up second away win of the season | Crawley Town skipper's discussions with squad play key role in Colchester United win

Liam Kelly, Dion Conroy, and Ben Gladwin have been key players for Crawley this season, with The Reds winning all four games with both starting. Lindsey will be hoping that the latter two will be available on Saturday.

Lindsey said: “I think if they’re fit and their playing well, they start. Dion coming back in you saw that real calmness from him as we were building from the back and obviously Ben Gladwin is the captain who I just feel that the players feel better when he is on the pitch.

“We just got to manage them through the week.”

It has almost been a year since Lindsey came in as Crawley manager, and since keeping them in the football league he has turned their form round and pushed the club up the table, including a 46%-win rate to go with that. Lindsey said: “We are on target for where I feel we should be, I think we about right and what we want to do is maintain what we’ve done so far and keeping around it and having a push at the end.

Lindsey went on to comment how much he is enjoying working at the club. He said: “I really enjoy working for this football club, the players, the staff, everybody connected to the club are brilliant to work with, fans obviously different class, I appreciate them, and they appreciate me.

“Since I came in January, we’ve come a hell of a long way from what we was to where we are now.”