SWINDON Wildcats head coach Aaron Nell is preparing his side for the biggest game of their season when they travel to Basingstoke on Saturday night.

Last Sunday’s point away to Milton Keynes Lightning saw them move into fourth place in the English Premier League Cup table.

Travelling to Basingstoke Bison tomorrow, Nell knows a win in their final combined league and cup game will secure their place in the semi-finals of the cup.

Twenty-five years ago this week, the Wildcats won their first silverware as a club and now Nell is hoping to emulate that success.

“It’s our biggest game of the season and we’re looking forward to it,” he said.

“After getting a point against Milton Keynes, we knew that is was in our hands and we can’t wait.

“Coming home on the bus against Peterborough two weeks ago, I didn’t think that we’d be in this position if I’m being very honest and I’m sure a lot of our fans and players didn’t.

“The result obviously matters, but what we have got to do is focus on putting in the effort that we did on Sunday at Milton Keynes and if we do that, we have every chance of winning.

“Right now, we are looking at one game at a time and we can even drop it down to a period at a time and play hard for three periods on Saturday.

“If we do that, we can all look each other in the eye and say that we have given it our best.

“Karma is a funny thing, if we work as hard as we did on Sunday night and put away our chances, then I think we can do well.

“That is all you want. You want it to be in your hands to go through in a competition and we have got that.”

Nell revealed last week that he and Callum Buglass were both out for the season as a result of their dislocated shoulders, while Toms Rutkis isn’t expected to return to the ice from a knee injury, picked up at the beginning of October, until Christmas.

Nell says they are still in the market for new recruits but will not make any rash decisions and believes his current roster are capable of absorbing the load for now.

“Not one player is going to replace them,” he added.

“Let’s be frank, we’ve probably got our two best offensive British players out of the line-up, me and Toms.

“It is not anyone who is going to replace the both of us, it is about everyone chipping in and I think in the last two weeks we have done that.

“If a player does become available, it will be more for the long term, it’s not just a quick fix.

“If that comes available then we will go for that but if it doesn’t, we are very happy with our team and we just need to keep working because however hard we worked on Sunday, it felt good.”