Promotion-chasing Dartford boss Alan Dowson thinks it’ll be a dog-eat-dog world at the business end of the season.

Dowson’s troops sit comfortably inside the National League South play-off positions in second but are 17 points adrift of champions-elect Ebbsfleet United after one win in their last five games.

They dropped points again on Tuesday in a 1-1 draw at second-bottom Hungerford. They trailed before striker Alex Wall's second-half header saw them equalise.

Darts host a Farnborough side, who will still harbour ambitions of finishing in the top seven themselves, this Saturday.

But, regardless of who they play, Dowson expects their opponents to be fighting for something, just as much as his own players are.

“With 10 games to go, it doesn’t matter how you get results,” he said.

“It doesn’t matter how you get them. Hopefully, we can get those results from the games we have coming up.

“It’s the business end of it. I’m not daft - there’s no easy games.

“Teams are fighting at the bottom and firing at the top as well.

“It’s going to be a dog-eat-dog world and we need to make sure we’re prepared.”

Dartford lost 3-1 at Weymouth on Saturday and Tuesday’s draw means it’s now just two wins from their last nine league games.

But Dowson said: “That’s not a concern, not at the minute.

“We will just get results as quickly as we can because we know we need to win some games, going forwards.”

The weekend loss at Weymouth came despite a first-half goal from striker Pierre Fonkeu.

“It was a very tough day,” he reflected. “It was horrible.

“We spent a lot of money, getting a hotel down there.

“We played some good football in their half but it doesn’t matter if you’re not 100% on it all the time.

“But we just need to crack on, which we will. It was really disappointing on Saturday.

“I had the hump on Saturday and Sunday. Then Monday morning, I was with [assistant] Christian Jolley at the ground.

“We just need to work harder and the players need to work harder.”

Dartford weren’t helped by decisions made by the officials at Weymouth, either, which included midfielder Jack Smith racing into the penalty area and appearing to be fouled - only for referee Neil Pratt to award a goal kick, rather than a penalty.

Dowson admitted: “The first one, it’s an awful decision! But fair play to Weymouth on Saturday.

“Being second in this league is an unbelievable achievement for us.

“We’ve had one loss in seven [league] games so it’s not as bad as you’re making out.

"We just need to get back to normal as quickly as we can.”

The Darts had kept two consecutive league clean sheets before the Weymouth encounter.

But it was more the way the goals were conceded - rather than the fact they were conceded - which irked Dowson.

He said: “We hadn’t conceded many goals.

“It’s not so much the goals we conceded, it’s how we’ve defended when we’ve conceded the goals.

“They can be prevented, just by the defenders defending.”

Farnborough arrive at Princes Park 10th, six points outside the play-offs.