CRAIG Hopkins used to give Paul Cox a lift to matches, but the Matlock Town manager will be offering his old team-mate no easy ride this weekend.

Hopkins – who leads Evo-Stick Northern Premier Division side Matlock along with Glenn Kirkwood – played alongside Cox at Kettering Town and would drive him down to games and training.

The duo were part of the Kettering team who reached the FA Trophy final in 2000, going down 3-2 at Wembley in a game Cox missed through injury and where Hopkins came on a late substitute.

Both managers arrive at Holker Street tomorrow with dreams of emulating that successful run – Matlock having already come through four rounds to reach the last 32 and having accounted for AFC's National League stable-mates Solihull Moors 2-1 in the last round.

Hopkins knows his side will be the underdogs – as they were against the Moors and other victims AFC Halifax Town – but he believes the Gladiators have every chance of repeating the club's feat of four years ago, when they knocked out Cox's promotion-bound Mansfield Town team.

“It's a massive game for us against National League club and to be in the last 32 of the Trophy,” said Hopkins, whose side will face former player Ross Hannah tomorrow, whose 52 goals in the 2010/11 season are a club record.

“We've had a couple of good results in the Trophy so far, which people perhaps didn't expect from us, and this is another great game for us, and one to look forward to.

“You've got to think you've got a chance. We went to Solihull Moors, who are not as good a Barrow, but they're in Barrow's league. We went there and won 2-1, so there's nothing to say we can't get a result again.

“We treat it in the same way as a league game. It's the same game, it's 11 against 11, it's on the same size pitch. There are not too many differences there, we're just playing against much better players than we are used to.”

Both sides go into tomorrow's fixture on the back of defeats – Barrow having lost 1-0 at home to Southport on Tuesday and Matlock falling to a 2-1 loss against Corby Town which left them sixth in the Evo-Stik.

Matlock, the 1975 FA Trophy winners, were without a number of players for that match – including former Bluebird Ted Cribley, who was ill – and will wait to see who returns for this weekend.

Hopkins is not too worried about Barrow's form, concentrating instead on his own team, and said: “It doesn't make too much difference. I know Paul Cox, he's a mate of mine, and I've been watching Barrow's results. They went on an amazing run for four months and that has got to come to an end at some point.

“Losing to Rochdale in the third round of the FA Cup is no disgrace – it's brilliant for Barrow to get to the third round of the FA Cup – and then they've lost another couple of games in there, but that's going to happen at times. Every club has a dip at some point.

“I don't think it really makes too much difference to us regarding Barrow's form.

“We'll see what's what with the players coming back. We did have a few missing last Saturday, but we got beat fair and square. We won't make excuses, we were beaten by the better team on the day and we will crack on.

“We’ll have a good following there who we know will get behind us and we want to give them something else to cheer about.”