Crucial Festive period looming for Mansfield Town as they seek a first win in eight games

But a vital 0-0 draw at Charlton Athletic last weekend ended a run of five successive defeats and boss Nigel Clough is hoping his men can build on that when Steve Evans' Rotherham United visit the One Call Stadium on Saturday.

The Millers are down in 17th place, but a win would see them leapfrog Mansfield in a tight division and Clough said: “With us having the run we've had – bottom of the form table in the last half dozen – the next five games offer us an opportunity to get results.

“We are not panicking due to the nature of our recent performances. But we still have to get points.

“The Christmas period is always absolutely vital with 15 points at stake over the next couple of weeks or so.

“So it would be nice to get off to a good start with a positive result on Saturday.

“This period is also a test of your squad and I don't think anyone will play the same team over the next five games. We will need them all - we all share the load.

“It tests the strength of your squad and the character of your squad and you need to get the balance right between playing, resting and training.

“We are fortunate we have almost everyone fit apart from Lee Gregory, though we do have Louis Reed suspended for Saturday.

“Alfie Kilgour and Stephen Quinn were just outside the 18 on Saturday but we are going to need everyone over the Christmas period.”

He added: “What we don't want to do is to get in a position where we are too close to the bottom three and then everybody gets a bit nervous and a bit edgy.

“If we can, we want to avoid that, but at the start of the season we knew that was a possibility.

“With the start we had we should be up nearer to 30 points by now, but if you'd offered us 25 points and a place in the Third Round of the FA Cup at this stage before the season started I think most people would have taken it.

“It is only the way in which we started that has led us all to wish for a few more.”

Rotherham have won their last two games and Clough said: “They have had a few good results recently and having beaten Northampton 3-0 at home on Saturday they will come here in good spirits.

“But so will we – and so we should be. Our last home performance against Huddersfield was good and we were unlucky to lose it.

“So we need to take that confidence from Saturday into this one.

“We need to be as solid as we were at Charlton, defending against their threats – of which they have quite a few.

“They are very strong on set plays and very robust and physical up there.

“We need to deal with that, get the ball down and do our stuff.”

Clough is ready for a touchline battle with ex-Stags boss Evans but said: “We are okay – I have never had too many problems with Steve Evans.

“We have had a lot of battles over the years going back to his Crawley and Boston days.

“That was probably when we had most of our battles, when we were at Burton and he was at Boston.”

Clough thinks his side will take great heart from Saturday's draw at Charlton.

“We will be lifted by getting a point and a clean sheet,” he said.

“It was very important not to lose, having played so well in the previous five league games and losing them.

“We probably didn't play as well on Saturday as we had in those five previous games, but we battled away and defended well.

“We had a few good situations and would have liked to have won the game, but I think it was more important on Saturday that, if we couldn't win it, then not to lose it.

“I think everyone breathed a huge sigh of relief that we had stopped the losing run.

“It is important we don't lose sight of how well we have played over the first four months of the season.

“No one has been down, despite the results. Everyone is being realistic about us being in this league and going to places like Charlton.

“There is no reason for the lads to get down.”