Struggling Newport still looking up

The Forton Road men have won just two of their nine games in National Division Three Midlands, and remain plagued by injuries for tomorrow's testing trip to third placed Luton.

They begin the game with only Bedford below them in the table, knowing up to three teams could be relegated this season.

But officials saw signs of encouragement in defeat with last week's performance against Peterborough and remain confident of the long-term prospects.

"Bedford are clearly struggling but if you take them out of the equation it's very tight and we haven't got too much ground to make up to get out of the bottom three," said chairman of rugby Ray Price.

"We know when we get all of our players fit, we are still a jolly good side so we are very hopeful of the improvements after Christmas and confident we will climb the table.

"We know tomorrow's going to be difficult because Luton are a good side.

"But hopefully we can tighten up defensively on last week and look as dangerous as we did when we were going forward and creating lots of opportunities."

Luctonians will be aiming to get back on the winning track when they travel to bottom-of-the-table Bedford.

"They have scored 154 points which is more than we have, but have conceded 433 which is proving to be their problem," said spokesman Robin East.

The Lucs will be hoping centre Leon Mells will have recovered from injury which forced him to miss last week's defeat to table-topping Ampthill.

Full-back Mike Thompson and centre Cameron Hewitt could also return to the squad.

Hereford will be out to consolidate their mid-table position when they take on Kettering at Wyeside.