Port Vale midfielder Danny Pugh believes the side are building their confidence up again after Vale's recent encouraging performances.

The Valiants go into Stevenage at the weekend off the back of two long distance away games in the space of three days, which saw them pick up a point in each match.

The results leave Port Vale sitting 7 points clear of the relegation zone and with a favourable goal difference, and despite the two points looking precious in the long run, Pugh is eager for a win.

"We had two quite long journeys but the two performances we were quite pleased with but disappointed not to come away with more points."

"Obviously we need to score more goals, the performances have been good and against Grimsby we were desperately unlucky not to come away with the three points.

"Even on Tuesday we did enough to win the game, but that's not been the case. Obviously the confidence is there with the two performances we've had."

In the absence of Tom Pope, Danny Pugh has stepped up and been given the captains armband. The midfielder is relishing the run of games the Valiants face in the next few weeks which Pugh describes as "big games", and says the team are very much looking forward to them.

Midway through the month and Vale still have four games remaining left to play, with Chesterfield being the final side to visit Vale Park before the end of March.

Despite the traffic of fixtures approaching, Pugh would rather look on the positive side of things.

"It's a busy few weeks but it's not a bad thing to get the games coming thick and fast. We need to turn the draws into wins and that's something we'll be looking to do starting tomorrow.

"We know tomorrow is going to be a tough game, we always say it every game is a tough game in this division and it is. I don't think there's a huge difference between the teams, we know it's going to be a challenge, we know it's going to be hard but it's a game we're going to go out to try and win."