CIRENCESTER TOWN boss Brian Hughes feels it is 'Saturday or never' as they try to progress past Gosport Borough into the First Round Proper of the FA Trophy.

Town have eased past both North Leigh and Tonbridge Angels but now face their toughest task so far in a competition that ends in a Wembley final on May 22.

"We're at home and I think we'll get only one crack at it," said Hughes, whose side have slipped from second to 18th in the Southern Premier League.

"We will hope to catch them when they are not at their best. They are going well in National League South and there are no easy draws against teams at that level.

"We will have a go, at least we have started to play a bit better in the last three or four games."

Facing Hughes in the opposition dugout is one of the larger-than-life characters of non league football, Alex Pike.

The Gosport manager was a policeman in the serious crimes unit until leaving the force after a car crash which nearly paralysed him in 1991.

Having acted as assistant manager at Wimborne he was able to take on his first sole managerial post in the 1991/2 season and won the Wessex League title, the Dorset Senior Cup and the FA Vase with a 5-3 victory over Guiseley at Wembley Stadium.

At the time, Pike was only 32 and is still the youngest manager ever to win the FA Vase.

He joined Gosport Borough in 2005 and has taken them to three promotions and the FA Trophy final in 2014, when they lost to Cambridge United – then of the Conference Premier and now a Football League Two side. Pike would dearly love to make it a hat-trick of appearances at Wembley and says of Saturday's opponents: "Cirencester have had a couple of good results in the competition already, beating Tonbridge Angels and North Leigh. It isn’t an easy draw but it could have been a lot worse."

Pike does not hide the fact that his hero in management is Brian Clough and Hughes remembers only too well his opposite number's last visit to the Corinium Stadium in September, 2009.

It was at a time when the two dugouts were adjacent as opposed to 60 yards apart as is now the case and Pike lived up to his reputation as one of the loudmouths of non league football.

"We were 2-0 up and cruising, and also had a stonewall penalty turned down, when Pike bellowed at his team 'You are losing to the worst team I've ever seen'," said Hughes.

"It was the first time I have ever been left speechless.

"I knew David Birmingham, his assistant at the time, and he did apologise."

But history relates that Pike's hair-dryer treatment on his team galvanised them and the game ended at 3-3 with Cirencester hanging on grimly for a point.

Hughes will be hoping to get Pike similarly agitated on Saturday – but this time see his Cirencester Town side finish the job.

They will certainly be up against it looking at Pike's star-studded squad.

In the 2-1 victory over Oxford City on Saturday his three starting strikers were George Barker (with Swindon Town in League One last season), Rowan Vine (previous clubs include Portsmouth, Birmingham City, QPR, St Johnstone and Hibs) and Justin Bennett, who scored his 250th goal for Gosport against Oxford on his 386th appearance for the club.