“I AM sure they’ll want to beat me as much as I want to beat them.”

So said manager Paul Marshall as he prepares to take his bruised Pickering Town team to former club Tadcaster Albion for a Boxing Day derby.

The North Yorkshire rivals square up in the Evo-Stik League east division at 1pm on Wednesday at Tadcaster’s i2i Stadium, with the Pikes desperate to bounce back from Saturday's 5-1 home drubbing by Sheffield as well as stall Albion's progress.

The i2i has been a footballing home of a number of Pikes players in addition to Marshall, including former Brewers captain Nick Thompson, Josh Greening – who moved back to Mill Lane in the summer – and assistant-manager Denny Ingram.

Marshall said of the return to Tadcaster: “I’m looking forward to it. The club is very close to my heart.

“I had a great seven years there. We had some wonderful FA Cup and FA Vase runs, winning (Northern Counties East League) division one and the (NCEL) President’s Cup.

“I’ve got some good memories.

“It will be very interesting to a lot of people, to me and the players. It’s a big game for Josh because he was with them last season.

“It’s always good to have a local derby. I still get on well with a lot of the people at Tadcaster and I’m sure they’ll want to beat me as much as I want to beat them.”

Taddy – whom Marshall managed between 2008 and 2015 – are currently riding high under Simon Collins and have just picked up the tier’s Club of the Month award.

The Brewers are now unbeaten in 11 league games, collecting 27 points, with Saturday's 1-0 win at Carlton Town lifting them to second in the standings.

Pickering, meanwhile, are playing at Step 4 level for the first time in their history, with Marshall having achieved promotion with them last season from the NCEL premier division.

The Pikes face a relegation scrap having slipped to 18th in the table but they have games in hand on the teams around them and had been in decent form prior to Saturday, with the reverse to Sheffield being their first league defeat since the start of October. They had otherwise lost only two cup games in their previous 12 outings.

Marshall, now focusing on Tadcaster clash, said of their hosts: “They are flying at the moment, doing well in the league.

"Simon Collins came in as one of my coaches and he’s done a great job these last couple of seasons. He has a philosophy of playing football and when they attack, they attack with pace.

“We haven’t played a Boxing Day game for a while, so it’s new to us. It will depend on how fit the players are. Over Christmas, I’m sure they’ll have had an extra glass of wine or an extra mince pie. It’s about who looks after themselves best over Christmas.

“It’ll be an interesting game, either high-scoring or a 0-0 draw. We don’t know what we’re going to get although you’d like to think players are getting more and more professional (taking care of themselves) and we’ll get an entertaining game.”

In the Evo-Stik premier division, Scarborough Athletic host fellow promotion-chasers South Shields in another potential Christmas cracker on Boxing Day following their dramatic 3-2 win at Workington on Saturday.

The Seadogs won that game late on as Bailey Gooda put them 2-1 up with three minutes to go before Michael Coulson netted in the last minute.

Sean Paterson pulled one back in the fourth minute of injury time before more drama followed with no fewer than four players sent off - Gooda and sub Jamie Forrester for Scarborough and Kyle May and Matthew Douglas for the hosts.

In the National League, Harrogate Town face a Yorkshire derby at home to Halifax as they look to bounce back from Saturday's 2-1 defeat at Eastleigh.

Harrogate, now fourth, will be favourites against the 16th-placed Shaymen who have only won one of their last six outings.