The New Saints must take advantage of continuing to play while fixtures for most of the JD Cymru Premier League’s sides are halted, says manager Scott Ruscoe.

The Saints are among a handful of teams in the league who are permitted to continue playing throughout the Welsh national lockdown which came into effect last Friday.

Only TNS, Bala Town and Haverfordwest County are allowed to continue their fixtures, while the rest of the league has been put on hold.

Saints boss Ruscoe said: “We’re in a position where we had seven first team regulars out, with some not playing, so other teams might be looking at the teams which are still playing and think it’s a good opportunity to have a rest mid-season.

“When you can play you’ve got to – we’re playing well at the moment and are five points clear of second place having played the same number of games.

“Continuing to play throughout this period will only help us if we do really well against Bala and get that gap at the top extended.

“We just want to make sure we can take advantage of it.

“In the run of form we’re in, it is good to keep the fixtures coming.”

Having played out the only JD Cymru Premier fixture on Saturday with a 3-2 win over Haverfordwest County, TNS will face Bala Town a week on Saturday, two days before the lockdown period ends.

Ruscoe’s side has now won eight and drawn one of their nine games and he has given credit to the attitude of his players.

“The mentality is massively important,” he said. “We had seven clean sheets in a row and have been doing really well.

“We didn’t look like conceding, until the last two games when we’ve conceded a couple in each – it happens.

“If you look at the Aberystwyth game when we drew, some of our play was excellent and they grabbed a couple of goals against the run of play, but that cost us.

“We could’ve lost that game and the game on Saturday with Haverfordwest, but the mentality we have within the squad prevented that from happening.”