Shamrock Rovers manager Stephen Bradley insists he is not looking over his shoulder at Dublin rivals Bohemians ahead of Friday's clash between the two sides at Tallaght Stadium.
Rovers survived an injury-time scare to cut the deficit to leaders Dundalk to four points with a 2-1 victory over Waterford last night.
That result moved the Hoops to within four points of the defending champions, who still have two games in hand.
Bradley’s men sit 12 points clear of Bohemians but the Dalymount team have had by far the better of it against Rovers over the last few years and are unbeaten in this fixture for eight games.
Despite that, Bradley is not concerned about the gap between the two sides closing and insisted that he’s looking up the table, not down.
When asked by RTÉ Sport if he was worried about Bohemians closing the gap on them, he replied: "It doesn’t concern me honestly, we look at what we’re doing an only us.
"It’ll be a big atmosphere, big crowd, two good teams but like I said, we can’t be going into this game in any better shape than what we are right now and we’re really looking forward to it.
"You’re always looking at how you can improve and for us to improve we need to go from second to first, so you look ahead of you, not behind you.
"Obviously if we want to keep our league hopes alive we’ve got to go and win every game, Friday’s no different.
"We go into the game in brilliant shape, our form is good, we’ve conceded very few, so we’re going into the game in really, really good form.
"Everyone’s fit so we couldn’t really ask for much more."
Rovers weren’t at their fluid best against Waterford on Tuesday evening and needed to bring the rested duo of Jack Byrne and Aaron McEneff off the bench to make sure of the points.
For Bradley it was matter of being able to ensure players don’t suffer burn out as the season reaches it’s climax and he’s confident that both will be ready to go on Friday.
"We need to be careful, Aaron’s not long back from his injury and Jack’s played every minute," he said. "I felt there was a chance to give him a little break and refresh him because like I said, he’s played every minute.
"We’ve been like this the last two months, we’ve changed it every week and always freshened up with the two games a week, so tonight was not different, I think people are looking because it’s Jack and Aaron so people will talk about it."
