Glenn Roeder wants Stevenage to take the game to Crawley Town this weekend and build on the 6-1 success over Hartlepool United.

Boro can break into League Two’s top 10 on Saturday should they get one over Dermot Drummy’s side, but Roeder expects this weekend’s opponents, who are two places above Stevenage in 13th, to be hurting after their 3-0 loss against Portsmouth last week.

Speaking ahead of tomorrow’s game, Roeder said: “It’s a game we need to win and get back-to-back wins. But there aren’t any easy games in any of the leagues.

“You would think Crawley will be hurting after their defeat against Portsmouth and they will want to fight back. We’ve got to meet that challenge, especially early on, and take the game to them.

“They’ve had the biggest turnover of players in League Two, I think around 20 players, and it’s normally hard for that many new players to gel.

“They’ve had a reasonable start to the season although obviously they’ll be disappointed with their result at Portsmouth.

“I did my A licence many years ago with Dermot Drummy. I got to know him over those two weeks and he’s worked at some big clubs at youth level. He’s worked really hard to get this opportunity to manage in league football.

“We’ve watched their games and we know they like to knock the ball around and keep possession, which is the style of football we like to play but in a positive manner.”

Dale Gorman (knock) should be available this weekend while Luke Wilkinson (knee) should return after missing out against Hartlepool.

Jobi McAnuff is also back in contention for tomorrow’s match following international duty with Jamaica.

“I think Dale Gorman has a slight knock but we’re not expecting any problems with him for the weekend,” Roeder, Boro’s managerial advisor, said.

“Luke Wilkinson is back in training, he trained [Thursday] morning and there was no reaction. Hopefully when he comes in [Friday] he’ll train again and then Darren [Sarll] has a nice problem because we have three very good central defenders to choose from.

“Ben Kennedy is back in training as well, training hard, but he said to me ‘I don’t know if I’ll get into the youth team after winning 6-1’ and currently he’s our joint-top scorer.

“But that is the beauty of having a squad now that is virtually doubled up in every position. We’ve got two players in every position of similar ability and that’s a great motivating factor for the players who do have the shirt.

“To keep the shirt they’ve got to play really well because there’s someone good enough to replace them.”