Gosport without ‘big hitters’ but boss Gale is demanding a much improved display in Southern Premier League trip to Salisbury

That's the verdict of manager Shaun Gale, who was less than impressed with his side's below-par efforts as they bowed out of the FA Trophy at struggling divisional rivals Dorchester Town at the weekend.

Gale has not been helped by a mounting injury list that has worsened with Bradley Tarbuck and Theo Lewis forced off against the Magpies.

The Borough boss admitted that he is likely to be without those two, along with Jordan Rose and Mike Carter, for Tuesday’s trip to Steve Claridge's unbeaten third-placed side.

Added to that, Matt Paterson is only 'half-fit' at the moment while Dan Wooden played through the pain barrier, netting in the defeat at Dorchester.

But even with what is likely to be a patched-up team, Gale is demanding a vast improvement against a Salisbury side who have netted six times in two of their last three matches.

‘We’ve had an horrendous run of injuries, I’ve lost two more senior players,' conceded Gale.

‘I’ve got some of my big-hitters missing but I’m not going to moan about it, it is what it is.

‘The important thing is that we go and are better than we were on Saturday.

‘I’ll only be critical of my team if I think they haven’t turned up.

‘I can’t be critical of them, apart from Saturday, this season.

‘It’s the one game they’ve played where we didn’t compete, weren’t at it.

‘It wasn’t acceptable and they were told that.

‘There are no excuses whoever they are, whether you’re young old or whatever, they need to be better.

‘They owe a performance, they do owe a performance.

‘Saturday was disappointing. We’ll go there and we need to make sure that Salisbury know they’re in a game and try to get three points.'

Borough have now gone six games without a victory in all competitions.

The Salisbury trip could represent Gosport's last action for a prolonged period with the country to be placed on a national lockdown from Thursday.

Gale is eager for his squad to put in a positive performance prior to the enforced break.

‘It’s a local derby for us and Steve has got a good squad of players there,' he added.

‘We’ll be in for a tough game but we’ve got to make sure we’re much better than we were Saturday, much better.

'It’s important we go to a team that are flying high, give a good account of ourselves and most importantly win a football match because that’s what we’re going there to do.'

Salisbury could field four ex-Gosport players - Charlie Kennedy, Charlie Davis, Sam Roberts and Warren Bentley.

Kennedy netted twice in Saturday’s 6-0 caning of fellow divisional high-fliers Tiverton in an FA Trophy tie, while the previous weekend Claridge’s men had won 6-1 at Dorchester in the league.