The Cornish All Blacks know better than to take National League Two South strugglers Barking lightly this weekend.
The Launceston club have enjoyed a good first year under their head coach Spike Rainford, but one or two defeats have caught them by surprise.
Although losses at Southend and Lydney were disappointing, a reverse at home to Barking this weekend would cause real frustration.
Tomorrow's visitors to Polson Bridge have earned only eight league points all season and suffered a 65-0 thrashing against Taunton in their last outing.
The All Blacks beat them 61-0 in the reverse fixture in November. Despite those statistics, Rainford remains cautious. He said: "You never say never, you can't take anything for granted in this league – as we found out at Southend and Lydney – it comes back to bite you if you do.
"The first thing for us will be to make sure we control the game, get in front and then we look at what we might want to do from there.
"It is probably the hardest thing, in many ways. We have got [league leaders] Worthing in a couple of weeks and that will be no problem at all because everyone knows what is expected and you have to be on your game.
"It is not so much motivation that is a problem against Barking, it is getting everyone in the right frame of mind for the game."
This week, the All Blacks confirmed Rainford will continue as their head coach next season. He feels the last four games of the current campaign are crucial to their preparations for next term. He said: "There are four games left and we are sixth in the table, nothing major will happen, whatever. But these last four games is what we take into next season.
"We want the best results we can get and to pile some points on the board to put a marker down for next season."
The All Blacks recovered from back-to-back losses against Lydney and Shelford with a win over Bournemouth last weekend.
Rainford said: "Bournemouth were a big, strong outfit. It took us a little bit of time to take control of the game. Once we got on top of the pace of the game in the second half, we started to pull away and put some daylight between us.
"A couple of weeks before, we played Shelford and did well, we lost at Lydney and had a poor game so last week was more about getting back to results being the key thing for us.
"It was not the most fantastic game but we scored some classy tries. We did exactly what we needed to do and that was to put five points on the board. To be successful we need to learn to grind wins out week after week."
Although Rainford was delighted to welcome back Barrie-John Chapman from injury last weekend, he will still be without Mike Rawlings and Jamie Tripcony for the game against Barking.
"Mike is still out with his shoulder problem," confirmed Rainford. "The MRI scan from a few weeks ago was inconclusive so we have asked for some other opinions. B-J Chapman is back, he came through the game unscathed last week but Jamie Tripcony is still not back, but will be next week."
