Carmarthen Town head into what is their biggest game of the season yet on Saturday as Newtown visit the JD Welsh Premier League’s basement club.
The side have accumulated just four points so far with their only victory being a freak 4-0 win at Bala Town two months ago.
Carmarthen’s form has nosedived since that rare win culminating with a heavy 5-0 reverse at the hands of Cardiff Met a week ago.
Newtown, currently five points ahead of Carmarthen, will plunge the Old Gold further towards a relegation crisis should they inflict another defeat at Richmond Park. In the event of a Newtown win, Mark Aizlewood’s side would become eight points adrift, which even with just a quarter of the season gone, will cause considerable concern.
There is still plenty of time for Carmarthen to save their season, of course.
Few managers in the Welsh Premier League possess as much experience as wily Aizlewood but despite appearing steady and unnerved in his post-match interviews, he will be perplexed by his squad’s diminishing stock just a season after boldly securing a top-six spot with performances based on self-belief, discipline and endeavour.
As we know, the margins in the Welsh Premier continue to become finer each passing season and even a club as established as Carmarthen are not immune from the threat of the drop.
Defeat to Newtown will call Carmarthen out as relegation candidates and leave Mark Aizlewood to ponder the thought of a major rebuild in the January window in which to save their season.