Newark Town boss Luke Parsons welcomes rivalry with Newark & Sherwood ahead of Boxing Day derby in United Counties League

Newark Town boss Luke Parsons welcomes the rivalry with Newark & Sherwood as the clubs gear up for their Boxing Day derby.

The teams meet at Harrowby FC in a 12.30pm kick-off in what will be the first competitive meeting as Step 5 clubs in United Counties League Premier Division North.

“I think having a local rivalry is only good for the game,” said Parsons, whose side lost 4-0 at home to fellow high-fliers Lincoln United on Saturday. “You want fixtures like this that have got a bit of added spice.

“Going round the town, you’ve got two sets of fans and you want to see which fans are going to have the bragging rights.

“I just feel it’s a healthy rivalry that’s good for football.

“We’re looking forward to the game, they’ll be looking forward to the game and may the best team win.”

The only disappointment for Parsons is that the game won’t be played in Newark itself.

They looked into reversing the fixture after Newark & Sherwood, who groundshare out of town at Harrowby, were handed home advantage for the first meeting. It couldn’t be done, however, with the YMCA closed on Boxing Day.

“When the fixtures come out it’s the first one you look for,” said Parsons.

“In our league they always put your most local derby on Boxing Day and Easter Monday, so we knew when it was going to be, but from the start of the season to now we’ve played 30 games to get to this point.

“My only slight disappointment is that the game isn’t in Newark.

“It’s a shame we couldn’t have had it at our ground but hopefully that’s something we can try and get done for next season. We did ask the question after the fixtures came out.”

Visitors Town go into the game as the higher-placed side, sitting fourth, while the Highwaymen are 10th.

There’s eight points between them, although Newark & Sherwood have a game in hand.

“With derbies, I don’t think you have to look at the table because that goes out the window,” said Parsons. “They’re different games, a bit more nervy, a bit more on the edge, a bit more aggressive.

“It could be decided by one goal. The first goal could be key. Ultimately, it’s going to be a hard-fought contest.

“We put in a poor performance on Saturday and they come off the back of two losses so both teams will want to turn the screw and get out of the rut early.

“Usually when we’ve put in a bad performance, or lost a game, we’ve bounced back straight away and hopefully we can do the same again.”

Parsons isn’t one for telling players what they can and can’t do on Christmas Day.

And he doesn’t need to be, with the manager confident Blues players will be ready for the early kick-off.

He said: “I know how much it means to our players, so I haven’t got to be strict with them.

“I know they’ll turn up with the best mentality because they want to win this game.

“A lot of them have either played for this club for a few years or they know what this club’s about and what it means to the fans to win.”

Parsons was gracious in defeat after Newark were beaten by Lincoln United.

The sides swapped places in the table as the Blues suffered just a fourth league loss.

“Credit to the Lincoln - they were much better than us,” said Parsons. “From minute one we never got out of first gear.

“We struggled to get to grips with their formation, we had a bad start and didn’t recover.

“We lost every battle out there and that’s not like us.

“We know as a football club, the way we play and where we’ve got to in the league, everyone has to be 100 per cent.

“You can probably carry one, maybe two, but if we’ve got more than three players off it, we know we’re going to have an uphill battle to win.”