AFC Totton face their biggest league challenge of the season next Wednesday (7.45) when they travel to league leaders and fierce local promotions rivals Sholing in the Zamaretto South & West.

But, for the moment, Stags boss Stuart Ritchie can see no further than tomorrow’s potentially lucrative FA Trophy second qualifying round tie at home to Romford.

Although Totton’s main objective this season is to make it third time lucky in their promotion quest, the financial rewards of the Trophy cannot be ignored.

Already Ritchie’s men have banked £4,200 for beating Yate Town 3-0 and AFC Hayes 5-0 and there is another £3,000 on offer tomorrow – plus a possible plum tie against a Conference South club in the next round.

“We’ve got a big week coming up, but I view tomorrow’s game as the most important because it’s the next one,” said Ritchie. “Once that’s over, we can look forward to Sholing.

“It’s two tough games for us, but that’s what it’s all about. It’s far more enjoyable being with a club pushing for honours again than being with one that’s just looking to get three points to stay mid-table.

“Tomorrow’s a game that I personally would love to win. It’s good for the club to be in a big competition like the Trophy.”

Romford play at the same level as Totton in the Ryman League Division One North.

Just like Ritchie’s men, they sit third in the table, and they are on a decent run of form, unbeaten in four matches.

Since eclipsing Waltham Forest 2-0 away in the last round of the Trophy, they have picked up seven out of nine league points, most recently beating fallen Conference giants Grays Athletic 2-0 on Tuesday. “It’s going to be tough,” said Ritchie. “They’re going quite well and I expect a tight game unless we play really, really well.

“If we perform like we did when we beat Abingdon 7-0, no one can hold us back, we were outstanding. But we can’t expect to play like that every week.

“Last week we came through a hard game 3-1 against a big, strong North Leigh side.

“We weren’t very good compared to the standards we’d set over the previous two or three weeks, but we didn’t play badly either. We stifled them as much as they stifled us and they didn’t really hurt us.”

With the likes of Eastleigh and Havant & Waterlooville entering at the third qualifying round stage, Ritchie would love to host one of their big Hampshire rivals at Totton’s new Testwood Stadium home.

The Stags’ big move from Testwood Park will hopefully go ahead before the next round on November 20 and Ritchie said: “It would be lovely to get through tomorrow and get a home draw. It would really set the tone for the new ground to get a decent tie with a decent crowd to start the ball rolling.”

Frontman Mark Osman’s bad knee is still not 100 per cent, but full-back Aidan Lewis should be OK despite limping out of Tuesday’s Red Insure Cup defeat by Sholing with a dead leg.

For more non league news see today's Southern Daily Echo and Saturday's Pink.