SKIPPER Simon Heslop has insisted history counts for nothing as York City aim to win at Barrow for the first time in six attempts since 1971.

Heslop also lost with two clubs Torquay (4-0) and Wrexham (2-0) at Holker Street last term, while no National League side has returned from Cumbria with maximum points since last term’s champions Cheltenham back in February.

City forward Richard Brodie – the club’s most-experienced Conference campaigner – has reasoned that any successful side plying their trade in non-League football’s top tier must target victories at the likes of Barrow.

Heslop, meanwhile, reasoned that he does not want to become weighed down by the Minstermen’s win-less run of 27 games on the road, whilst acknowledging that this squad cannot shift all the blame for that sequence on last term’s team now.

He said: “I’m not entirely sure why teams don’t like going there (Barrow). It’s not the most attractive place to go, but I don’t want to get too hung up with history.

“Our away form hasn’t been good enough as a club for a long time, but this group of players have only been able to affect the last five games. Saying that, we’ve only got one point, which is nowhere near good enough.

“We’ve maybe just got to be a bit more clinical, but I don’t think we’re a million miles off away from home and we’re just looking at this game now and doing our best to get maximum points from it.”

Heslop is also no stranger to Barrow boss Paul Cox’s methods, having played for him during the first four months of the 2014/15 season at Mansfield prior to the latter’s dismissal.

The former Eastwood chief has guided unfashionable Barrow up to fourth in the National League standings, having previously won the 2013 Conference title with the Stags and Heslop pointed out: “He gets everyone on the same page and his team seem to be effective in doing what they do, but we know what to expect and there will be no excuses if we don’t deal with it.

“They’re a really physical team, who are quite direct and play for second balls. They’re really good in the air and are all about the fight, so we are ready for that and have got to stand up to it.”

Heslop is also looking for an improvement following a return of one point from a possible six after back-to-back home matches.

“We’ve not won in three games, which is really disappointing for us,” the 29-year-old midfielder admitted. “Looking back to the last two home games, we probably deserved to beat Tranmere and were a bit unlucky, but the Dover game wasn’t really good enough.

“They defended really well, but they set up to be broken down and we couldn’t do that. We didn’t create enough on the ball and didn’t have enough options going forward.

“The decision making in the final third could have been better as well.”