Both clubs are currently in bottom five of the table, but have already demonstrated their potential this season

Sporting Bengal United manger Imrul Gazi believes Sawbridgeworth Town are much better than their current position in the Essex Senior League suggests.

The Hertfordshire club are 18th in the table with six points from seven games having drawn three times and picked up one win.

Although they’ve not claimed too many victories, they have played third in the table Takeley twice and also faced leaders Hullbridge Sports and Waltham Forest within the last month.

At the weekend Sawbridgeworth beat Sports in the league and now they’ll travel to Mile End Stadium this evening.

Gazi said: “I spoke to their manager on Monday actually to sort out a few admin things and it sounds like they are in a similar situation to us.

“They have been playing well in matches and just not taking their chances plus they’re a fairly new team.

“Like us they have a couple of youngsters and I think it will actually be a really good match for the neutral.

“It is unfair to judge a team on the league table at the moment and they have been unlucky. Looking at their results, they’ve played a lot of good teams and got decent results.

“For us it is about getting points on the board. We want to keep getting as many as possible and we’ll judge things when we get to 10 games.”

While Gazi isn’t too interested in where Bengal are in the table, he is keen to see what attendances they are getting at Mile End.

And the former youth team coach has been delighted to see the local community coming out to support his team.

Bengal officially had 60 people in attendance on Saturday in the FA Vase against Stowmarket Town.

The figure recorded last Wednesday when London Bari visited was 75 and a 100 watched Tower Hamlets play Gazi’s men on August 31.

He said: “The pleasing thing for me of late is I can see we are really being backed by the community.

“For the Tower Hamlets match we had over a 100 and then for the London Bari we had just under that figure.

“One of my objectives when I first took charge of Bengal was to engage more with the community.

“That is why I wanted to use young players from the BFA and I believe people are seeing those guys being given a chance and want to see how they do.

“I’m getting people messaging me all the time after they have come and saying when is the next match so I’m delighted the community is following us.”

Anybody interested in seeing Bengal take on Sawbridgeworth tonight should head to the Mile End Stadium, 190 Burdett Road, E3 4HL. Kick-off is 7.45pm.