Barrow AFC defender Rhys Norrington-Davies believes tonight’s friendly against the club’s under-21 team gives the players a great opportunity to keep things ticking over on the pitch.

The Bluebirds’ squad would have otherwise been twiddling their thumbs over the weekend if the match at Holker Street hadn’t been arranged, with the first round of the FA Cup sadly taking place without them.

The 3-2 loss at Chorley in the fourth qualifying round last month opened a two-week hole where AFC would not be playing a competitive game.

They return to National League action, at home to Eastleigh, next Saturday off the back of five consecutive losses, but with some confidence restored after a good performance in the 1-0 defeat at Ebbsfleet United last week.

Norrington-Davies said: “It keeps us ticking over and we get to work on things we’ve been doing in training this week, which is the main thing.

“Obviously, we’ve got some new ideas and hopefully we can take those into a game situation.

“With us having games two weeks apart, we just need to keep ticking over, keep ideas in our head and we feel that in facing the under-21s we can do that.”

Norrington-Davies feels Barrow also need to continue to build momentum ahead of the Eastleigh visit.

Their confidence took a bit of a battering off the back of the defeat at Chorley, with it only returning during the match at Ebbsfleet, which they dominated almost from start to finish, only to be hit by Danny Kedwell’s sucker-punch winner.

Norrington-Davies said: “The game allows us to put what we did from last Saturday into another game perspective and hopefully we can just build on that and get our confidence up again.

“Our performance in the last game has certainly boosted the morale within the team and the gaffer was happy with our performance.

“Obviously, the result is the main thing and we were disappointed we couldn’t get that [at Ebbsfleet], but the way that we played has given us some confidence and hopefully we’ll take that confidence into our next game.”

Norrington-Davies, who is on loan from Sheffield United for the rest of the season, was involved in a controversial incident towards the end at Ebbsfleet when he was booked for an alleged dive over Sam Magri’s challenge.

Unlike the penalty awarded to Manchester City’s Raheem Sterling on Wednesday night, the defender was at least in close proximity to the 19-year-old, who insists he was not trying to con the referee.

“I was a little confused myself because if I don’t feel any contact then I won’t go down, I’m not that type of player,” Norrington-Davies said.