After a weekend without a game, stuggling Raiders are back in action on Saturday when they host fifth-placed Dings Crusaders, and second row McGowan said: "I definitely think we have the chance to survive this season.

"There are other teams in the same sort of situation as us – both Havant and Chinnor are struggling. Hopefully, we can come out better in the second round of the league and get some much-needed points on the board.

"Obviously, the goal is to stay up this year and then we can build from there. There are plenty of games left to starting getting some good results in."

McGowan returns to the squad after a knee injury and unavailabiliy, and said: "From what I've heard over the past two weeks things have been looking brighter and we've been playing much-better rugby, which is promising. It was always going to be a tricky season for us. A lot of guys from our squad moved on, and we've been left to rebuild the team with a lot of new players, which takes time.

"We also suffered from the loss of four or five of our overseas players. National League rules state we can only have two overseas players. It really hasn't helped losing these key members of our squad."

Raiders are missing a number of players for Saturday's clash. Polish international Kacper Lawski is unavailable, Mike Power is out after he broke his arm against Canterbury, and Richard Kaye misses out with an ankle injury. McGowan and Paul Cox return to the squad.

Raiders director of rugby Ian Davies said: "We do have a number of injuries, as we have done all season, but we need to get on with things.
"Dings Crusaders are a top side that are very disciplined.

"They are a great kicking team and will be looking to use that against us. It will be a very challenging game."

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