BLACKBURN Hawks coach Steve Duncombe is hoping his team can step their game up this weekend as they face the Moralee Conference's top two sides in a make-or-break double header.

The Hawks are away at Billingham Stars on Saturday (5.30pm) before hosting runaway league leaders Solway Sharks on Sunday (5.45pm), and with only five games remaining of the regular season two wins are vital for the Hawks to maintain their play-off hopes and stay clear of the drop zone.

Three defeats and a draw in their last four games have seen them slip four points off fourth place and Duncombe is in no doubt what is required this weekend.

"We are still battling for a play-off spot. Whenever I've battled for a play-off spot before in other leagues everyone steps their game up and I'm hoping we can do it as a team this weekend," he said.

"We must win both of those league games if we want to make the play-offs so they really are crucial points to us. It's going to be a tough ask but we've done it before so I don't see why we can't do it again.

"We beat Solway at the beginning of the season, but we've not done well against them since, they seem to be a bogey team for us and they've got a really strong team. Billingham we've come close to them a few times and we've beaten them as well."

The Hawks drew 3-3 with Sutton Sting last week and again Duncombe was left bemoaning a lack of consistency.

"We were disappointed to only get a draw last weekend but I think even then it was consistency that let us down," he said. "We had a couple of lapses in concentration and that cost us winning the game.

"We went through a good patch of winning and we seemed to be on top form. Then we played Solway twice and I think it just knocked the stuffing out of us a bit. We got back into the losing ways and it just creeps in.

"You've got to play loose and once you're winning you can do that and you have a better energy in the changing room. Once you're losing it's hard to try and get it back."