Man-of-the moment Cenk Acar has extended his loan with Spalding United until January ahead of Saturday’s trip to Evo-Stik NPL Divsion One South title rivals Newcastle Town (3pm).
Acar, who has been one of the Tulips’ top performers this season, was due to return to parent club Lincoln City this weekend.
However, both the 18-year-old and the Imps have agreed to stretch his stay at the Sir Halley into 2017 – a move that has delighted Spalding supremo Dave Frecklington.
He said: “For Cenk to have so much confidence and such a great attitude at his age is a credit to him. He’s in the form of his life and he actually asked to stay – which shows a lot about what we’re doing here at Spalding.”
The Tulips will lose the services of fellow Lincoln loanee Andrew Wright after Saturday’s showdown at Newcastle, but that has been tempered by the return of Mitch Griffiths – who made his latest debut for the club against AFC Rushden and Diamonds last week.
Spalding and Newcastle – who are in the top three – meet again at The M Club Stadium this weekend. But Frecklington feels neither team showed enough in last Saturday’s 1-1 stalemate.
He added: “The conditions weren’t great, but it was a very poor game. Both sides looked bang average if I’m honest.
“But we have to take stock. We’ve got an aim of taking two points from every game this season, which would give us 84 points and put us in the top three come May.
“We’ve had a great start to the season and just have to keep things going.
“Cards on the table, I’d be happy to go the Newcastle and pick up a point. But we’re also more than capable of taking all three points.
“I’d like to think that we’d have beaten them if we could have kept 11 men on the pitch.
“Individual errors and late goals have been costing us dear of late, so we’ve been working on that in training.
“If we can cut them out, we’ll turn draws and defeats into wins.”
Nathan Whitehead (suspended), Brad Barraclough (injury) and Neal Spafford (injury) all miss the trip.
