Big home games against Chesterfield and Wrexham are ones Kinsella "lives for"

Lewis Kinsella is relishing the chance to show against two of the league's big boys just why Stuart Maynard signed him

Injury, suspension and the form of others have limited the tough-tackling left-back to just three starts since he joined from Aldershot in the summer – and one of those he was sent off after nine minutes against Yeovil.

He was parachuted back into the starting XI on Tuesday night for the first time since late August in a bid to shore up a leaky defence – and he responded with a typically wholehearted performance that brought a long overdue clean sheet and three valuable National League points.

"I've obviously had a tough start here," he said. "I haven't played as much as I wanted to. I thought I'd be playing but there's some good players here and I've waited for my chance. Now I've got it, hopefully I can stay in, get a run of games, get fit and really show what I can do."

The Stones will need every ounce of the experience the 28-year-old has picked up at Aston Villa, Luton Town, Kidderminster, Colchester and Aldershot when they take on Chesterfield and Wrexham at The Vale in successive home games.

"These are the sort of games that I live for: the tough games," he said. "That's what I'm about. I want to play in the big games, whether that's at home or away. We've got some tough games but that's where we test ourselves and see where we're at."

Positionally, the Stones are 13th ahead of Tuesday's game with Chesterfield. Confidence wise, they are also in a better place after a first clean sheet since that home game with Yeovil and a first win since the first day of October.

"It wasn't pretty sight from, but kind of got a goal and then defensively we were really good," said Kinsella after the 1-0 win at Altrincham secured by Olufela Olomola's 47th-minute striker. "We've got some tough games coming up so we'll need to be to be good defensively.

"I said to the boys in the change room that when I was at Aldershot, and we went on a bad run, we needed to get back to basics. The boys did that today and were excellent. It wasn't the prettiest performance but we've come away with three points and the clean sheet.

"I think I think a clean sheet was the most important. Altrincham play good football ... and we were just shuffling, staying as a block and making it hard for them to break us down."

Click HERE to make sure you get your tickets in advance for the big home games against Chesterfield on Tuesday and Wrexham on Saturday.

* Pictures by Jon Taffel