Belmont Swansea attacking with eyes on NPL promotion prize

"I wanted a striker and I ended up with eight," Stafford said.

A new-look Belswans have opened the season with seven wins and 39 goals to make them favourites to take top spot and win automatic promotion to the NPL. Second, third and fourth also have a shot through a play-off series with the second-last team in the NPL.

Belswans are 10 points clear of nearest rivals Thornton and Stafford was keen for them to maintain the rage, especially up front.

"We've started well, but there's heaps of football to go," said Stafford, whose side are away to West Wallsend on Saturday.

"I think the other teams are catching up, so we'll just keep doing what we're doing. Scoring goals is the main thing. I'm pretty stoked about how that's going. We only scored 36 last year."

Kane Woolston, who returned to Belswans this season after a year off, leads the league with 11 goals, while recruits Adam Woodbine (7) and Ethan Hall (5) are next on the scorers' list.

Adam Blunden (Maitland) was the only notable local NPL recruit for Belswans, but they picked up Woodbine and Sam Kirk from the Central Coast, former Jets junior Ian Matthews, Nathan McAllister, Kye Abrahams and brothers Ethan and Matt Hall.

"Brendan Hall has been with us for four years and he got his brothers to come," Stafford said. "It was a good recruiting effort. We were pretty lucky to be fair.

"We had a five-year plan that we wanted to be promoted, so now we've got that chance we need to have a good squad to get the results.

"It's not like other promotions, which were based on things like money and facilities. This one is there to take, so it's been the plan to do it either this year or next year."

Stafford has been with the club since 2015, when promotion-relegation was last in place, and a shot at the NPL has long been his motivation.

He said the club was working hard off the pitch as well to get Blacksmiths Oval up to standard.

"We got the irrigation upgrade, new dugouts and we are getting new lights put in in a couple of months," he said.

"Everything is happening, it's been good.

"If we do go up, we'll take everyone we've got. We're a pretty young group, and an eager one.

"Promotion has made everyone pretty excited.

"There's something there and if we can get up, it will be exciting for everyone in the area to have one or two new teams. It just adds to it."

Also on Saturday, Cessnock City host Toronto Awaba at Turner Park (2:30pm), Singleton take on South Cardiff at Howe Park (4:30pm) and Thornton play Kahibah at Maitland Sportsground (5pm).

New Lambton coach Shane Pryce hopes to have skipper Sam Maxwell back on Saturday as he searches for a response from his players against Cooks Hill.

The Golden Eagles lost 2-1 to Lake Macquarie in round five and face another bottom-of-the-ladder clash on Saturday. Both teams sit on one point, although Cooks Hill have had a tougher schedule to start the NPL season and drew 1-1 to take the first points of the year off Valentine last time out.

Pryce said defender Maxwell (hamstring) should be back from injury this week, while Tom Siderovski could return to the first XI.

Lakes scored twice early in the second half to set up the win over New Lambton, who copped a half-time spray from Pryce for their poor effort.

"I was very disappointed with it, compared to what they've shown me this year," Pryce said. "I think we just had seven players who were nowhere near where they need to be for us to be competitive in a game.

"The only other team who's really done well against us and hurt us in the second half was Valentine. We've been in everything else, although I know we haven't played a lot of top teams. I just think we need a response.

"There's still 17 games to go, so they just need to turn up every weekend and we need nine or 10 players to do that for us to do well."

** Edgeworth have midfielders Keanu Moore and Chris Fayers in doubt but Andrew Pawiak likely back to take on Valentine on Saturday.

Moore came off with an ankle injury in the 2-0 loss to Charlestown, while Fayers hurt his knee in training. Pawiak missed the Azzurri loss with a strain.

"We turned over too much football and we didn't put a lot of pressure on them in the front third," coach Peter McGuinness said of the Charlestown game.

"A lot of the game was played in front of a pretty experienced backline, and they nullified us pretty well."