TOMMY MOONEY insists Town cannot afford to surrender six points to any of their rivals over the course of the season if the play-off chase is to end in triumph.

The on-song striker rifled home a cracking goal in Saturday's 1-1 draw at Sheffield Wednesday.

It prevented the Owls from doing 'the double' over Andy King's men and Mooney insists that Town must aim to give no-one the satisfaction of beating Town twice during 2003-4.

Mooney, who netted his 12th goal of the season at Hillsborough, said: "By getting the draw at Sheffield Wednesday it prevented them from taking six points off us.

"If you are going to get promoted, you don't lose to the same team twice.

"You can't afford to be giving six points up to anybody.

"If you don't lose more than three points from each team then you do have a chance.

"You can't either keep beating the top teams or keep beating the bottom teams, you have to be picking points up off everybody."

While January may have started in joyous fashion, boss King is warning that much hard work remains to be done to ensure May proves memorable rather than miserable.

King feels his side are close to recapturing the form which saw them flirt with top spot in the early part of the campaign.

His summer recruitment spree has helped lift Town in a healthy position with 20 games to go but the County Ground boss has warned that the real judgement will be made in May.

Good judgement is crucial to a manager's success but a touch of luck doesn't go amiss when securing new recruits either.

King said: "I've been lucky this year to get in a lot of quality free transfers who I talked into coming to Swindon Town and we are gaining dividends from that.

"But the final judgement comes in May. We have to maintain standards and keep picking up results.

"In the last three to five games we've been back to where we were at the start of the season, a decent side at this level."

One player King will not be able to call on for much longer is defender Jerel Ifil.

The defender returns to Watford after this coming Saturday's clash with Colchester United.

Had the cash been available King admits he would love to have signed the youngster permanently.

He said: "Jerel has tremendous potential. The club know how I feel about him and the club know I want to buy him.

"The money isn't there but to me, Jerel Ifil, leaving aside his faults, is the quickest, strongest defender in this division."