Tim Dixon insists he can keep Hythe Town in the Ryman League but he knows time is running out to turn their faltering season around.

Cannons are just two points above the Division 1 South drop zone and if the teams below them win their games in hand, Town will slide back into the bottom-three.

A huge game lies in store on New Year’s Day when Hastings United – one place and two points above Hythe in the relegation battle – visit Reachfields.

It’s the first of 19 games Dixon has left to stop Hythe dropping into the Southern Counties East League.

He said: "It’s something I’ve never experienced before. It’s new territory for me.

"People have been given time and it’s not been good enough. I’ve got to look at the whole picture as we start a new year.

"People say they don’t look at the table until Christmas but I’ve been looking at it for some time – and here we are, down at the bottom. We can talk about bad luck and injuries but we simply don’t have enough points.

"The table doesn’t lie and the half-term report is that we’ve not been good enough. We’ve been punished for our mistakes and we’ve not been ruthless enough at the other end of the pitch.

"We’ve got to look at a lot of things and we’ve got to do it quickly to turn things around."

Read the full story in the Folkestone & Hythe Express.