Davies admits the pressure has been lifted by Slough Town's victory over Farnborough

A content looking Scott Davies admitted he won't be bringing his football boots to the Rebels’ final two games of the season after National League South safety was all but secured by Saturday's 2-0 win over Farnborough.

With the Rebels winning convincingly at home, and other results going their way at the weekend, Davies' side moved 10 points clear of the relegation places and only a mathematical miracle would now see them relegated. Only two sides in the bottom four, Cheshunt and Concord Rangers, can still conceivably catch them, but they'd need to win all their remaining games and hope Slough fail to pick up another point.

In short, it's very unlikely to happen, and Davies and his squad can finally rest easy knowing they've kept the club in the division when perhaps the odds were against them when Davies stepped into the void left by Neil Baker and Jon Underwood's departure in November.

Davies has certainly felt that pressure, and weight of expectation, but that lifted after first half goals from George Alexander and Johnny Goddard earned his side victory on Saturday.

The Rebels have two games left to play at Weymouth on Saturday and Braintree Town at home the following weekend (April 29), and Davies said in the aftermath of Saturday's victory that he'd be managing things from the side lines having more than played his part on the field this season.

“I won't be bringing my boots,” he said. “I've played a lot of games this season - perhaps more than anyone else - and I could do with a break.

“I'd also like to give some of the other lads, who haven't played as much recently, a chance to play and we should be able to do that now.

“I feel quite content. We needed other results to go our way as well but having looked at them just now, they've all gone for us.

“Over the past few months, I've driven myself insane looking at the league table, but it's because I care. My mum, dad and missus have all been on at me about this, asking me to try and switch off and to just focus on the next game, but I've found it hard to do that. Obviously, I got put into this position In November and it's a situation I've never been in before in my life. I felt like it was all on me. I took on a lot of the weight by agreeing to become manager and I’ve been panicking about the day when we might possibly go down.

“So, to get a result today is fantastic and it takes the pressure off massively.”

He added: “That's as good as any promotion I've ever had. Relegation hangs over you for such a long time, but at the same time it's made all our games exciting as we've had something to play for.

“If we'd gone down it would have been a catastrophe because of the size of this club, the squad, the supporters. I feel that we're too good to be in the league below but now I can look forward to the summer and where we go from there.”

Saturday's performance was far from perfect, but the Rebels got the job done and were largely untroubled by Farnborough's attempts to get back into the match in the second half.

“In the first half we were really good, we did the ugly stuff well,” added Davies. “Second half we went out with the mindset that we didn't want to be put on the backfoot. Unfortunately, we pretty much were, but at the same time it worked. The boys defended their goal brilliantly and Will Dennis was immense. Defence starts from the front and goes all the way back to the keeper and I felt we were solid on Saturday; they didn't have any gilt-edged chances that I can remember.

“Shane Bush did really well, and I was delighted to see his name go up as man-of-the-match. I don't think he's got the credit he's deserved since he's come in and he's had to jump up three leagues.”