Welling boss Peter Taylor has seen enough progression in his team to believe they’ll avoid relegation this season.

Only one side will go down in National League South but the Wings sit just six points above bottom side Billericay with 16 matches still to play.

Welling have won just once in 10 games following their 4-2 derby loss at Dartford on Saturday but now face a run of three home matches in their next four.

“We are improving defensively,” said Taylor. “We’ve got a ridiculous goal difference as we’ve conceded far too many goals and the players know that.

“We still have improved it from what it was three months ago. We’ve just got to keep going.

“There are very good teams in this division, it’s a tough division and we’ve got to keep working exceptionally hard to make sure we finish second from bottom and that’s the target that we’re all having a go at.

“As long as the players remain honest and focused about it, it’s not easy losing too many matches, but you’ve got to get on with it.

“I’ve got no doubt in my mind that we are getting there. If we start producing more performances like we did in the first half at Dartford then we’ll be fine.

“Thankfully for us you don’t play a team like Dartford every week but we’ve still got to do our work and show enough respect for the opposition.”

Welling twice led at Princes Park before promotion hopefuls Dartford scored twice in the last 16 minutes to take the points.

Taylor was not impressed with the goals his side conceded but saw plenty of positives from the work they did in possession.

“It was a big improvement from us in terms of us with the ball,” said the Welling boss. “I was pleased with how we created chances and scored goals.

“I’m disappointed with the four goals we let in, I’m sure Dartford would say they were good goals for them but for us they’re very poor goals. We’ve lost the ball in bad areas and not defended correctly.

“We’re disappointed with the goals conceded but seeing us on the ball there’s a big improvement from a few months ago.

“Steve King’s got a good team there, they got a lot of respect from us and we knew we had to play exceptionally well to have any kind of chance. We did that in the first half, I couldn’t ask for any more from the players apart from the goals we conceded.

“If teams score a really good goal against us I can live with that but it’s tough to take when you know it’s stoppable.”