JEFF Roberts is hoping that his rejigged Corsham Town side are taking heart from another positive display against a top side last weekend.

In a bid to improve squad morale, manager Roberts has recently let a clutch of players leave the club and last week, despite letting a two-goal lead slip, Corsham were able to secure a point at league leaders Cheddar.

On Saturday, Roberts’ men were beaten 2-1 by second-placed Chard Town, who took control through goals from Braeden Symes and Leigh Bailey before Matt Jenkins reduced the deficit in the second period to keep the visitors on their toes.

“Over the last few weeks, we’ve let four or five players go,” said the Corsham manager.

“There were some things happening internally that we didn’t like and even on Saturday, there was a bit of something going on in the dressing room after the game and we’ve mutually let someone leave the club because of that.

“It leaves us with a young side, which has seven or eight players under 19 in it, but people are a lot more relaxed and hopefully, we can just concentrate on moving forward.

“We are going through a little bit of a bad patch but hopefully the last couple of games are a bit of an eye-opener for the players, showing them that we can compete with the top sides.

“We were 2-0 up against Cheddar and should have won that game and we should have got the three points against Chard too.

“We were 1-0 down at half-time and they’ve scored a free-kick to go 2-0 up but we’ve stuck another one up front and created so many chances against them – Sammy Ockwell, Matty Jenkins and Kalum Youngsam have all missed chances and we should have won comfortably.”

Corsham face another tough test on Saturday when they travel to Hellenic League Premier Division Highworth Town, who reached the semi-finals of last season’s FA Vase, in the quarter-finals of the Wiltshire Senior Cup.

Highworth are also the county cup’s defending champions.