Michael Holden wishes the season was starting now after guiding relegation-threatened Irvine Vics closer to safety on Saturday.
The experienced centre-half was outstanding as the Westenders secured a battling goalless draw against promotion-chasing Rossvale to boost their Championship survival hopes.
Holden, 32, reckons Vics are in a better shape than they have ever been under new boss
Brian McLuckie.
And he believes recent results against some of the division’s top teams can give them confidence ahead of their final four games.
Irvine Meadow boss Brian McGinty urges players to give him one last big performance against Beith
He said: “From where we were at the start of the season, losing poor goals with the heads down, we’re not conceding much now.
“Seven weeks ago we were looking at the games left and thinking we need to take points off Kello and Girvan but we’ve proved we can compete with teams above us. It’s just a bit disappointing we didn’t have this team at the start of the season.
“It would have been interesting to see where we would have ended up.”
Holden reckons sorting out the defence has been key to the Westenders’ resurgence.
He said: “People were filling in at the back at the beginning of the campaign whereas we’ve got proper defenders in there now.
”It’s night and day. You’ve Jamie Donnelly in there who I’ve played with for years at different teams and young Ross Gilmour who has a good pedigree having played for Albion Rovers and Stenhousemuir. He has looked solid.”
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Vics host table-toppers Benburb this weekend and Holden sees no reason why they can’t spring another shock.
He said: “Not many teams would have expected us to get a point against Rossvale but we deserved it.
“There is a lot of quality in this league but if you make yourself hard to beat you are in with a shout.”
