BROMSGROVE Sporting boss Bren Kelly has challenged his high-flying squad to make it unbeaten until the end of the year.

The Rouslers earned a hard-fought 2-1 win at Stratford Town on Saturday to

take them up to third in the Southern League Premier Division Central - but level headed Kelly is refusing to let his side’s thoughts drift towards an eventual playoff place so early in the campaign.

He said: “We are not looking that far ahead right now, there’s a long, long way to go this season.

“I’ve set the side the challenge of going unbeaten from now until the end of December - after a tough set of fixtures at the start of the season, the schedule is looking a bit kinder to us towards the end of the year, so we’ll look to stay unbeaten until then and see where that takes us.

“A lot of the teams around us have games in hand, but a lot of those fixtures are against each other, so teams will be taking points off each other.”

Saturday’s win at Stratford came courtesy of Leon Broadhurst’s decisive 67th minute header - this after Mikey Taylor had put the Rouslers 1-0 on just 13 minutes, only for Stratford to equalise five minutes later.

Kelly added: “I was delighted with the win - it was a very heavy pitch and we really had to dig in and get our fingernails dirty.

“They had a lot of men behind the ball in the first half which made it difficult for us to create space, but we changed our shape in the second half and got more bodies forward - in the end it was a very dogged win.”

Sporting make the long haul to Needham Market this Saturday, with only Nathan Hayward a doubt with injury - although on loan defender Harry Higginson’s future may prove uncertain after his parent club Kidderminster Harriers appointed new manager Jimmy Shan last Friday.