ANDY HOLDSWORTH’s neighbours may not be talking to him again, but he’s far from worried.

Town’s skipper lives in an area populated largely by Leeds United supporters, so he’s hardly flavour of the month at the moment.

But Holdsworth, who has figured in three successive victories against the men from Elland Road, can afford to smile.

Lee Clark’s side have pushed to within sniffing distance of the top six, are in buoyant mood after the derby victory sealed by Nathan Clarke’s header and look primed to keep picking off those clubs above them in the table with a solid run.

For that to happen, the popular 25-year-old right-back accepts Town’s away record needs to improve, but he believes the club now have experienced added cover in the squad to help them achieve a target near to 80 points.

“When you look at the players we’ve got – not just in the starting line-up but on the bench and in the Reserves – there is real strength in depth,” said Holdsworth, who has over 250 senior appearances to his credit.

“It’s nice to see those sorts of options available to the manager at this important stage in the season and all the lads who have come into the club recently have slotted in well.

“In previous times we’ve had to call on lads from the Academy when the first-team pool has become stretched through suspensions and injuries and, while they’ve always done a good job, maybe the extra experience we’ve got in the squad now will prove telling in pushing us up the table.”

Holdsworth believes the manager did sound business in drafting in Dominik Werling, Lee Novak – who scored for Gateshead last weekend – Jonathan Tehoue and Lukas Jutkiewicz in the transfer window and, while the shirt numbers now stretch way into the 30s, he feels they’ll all have a valuable role to play.

“The gaffer identified we needed to strengthen in certain areas and he went out and got the players he wanted,” he said.

“Lukas has a high pedigree at Everton and I thought he did brilliantly against Leeds last weekend, holding the ball up, linking well and running strongly.

“People will like Jonathan when they finally get the chance to see him and Dominik brings pace and power to the team as well, and some more versatility on the left-hand side.

“It’s all looking very good and then we’ve got Boothy (Andy Booth) on the way back from injury as well after his run-out in the Reserves in midweek – and we all know what he can do.”

Holdsworth is pleased with his own form – he hasn’t missed a start in the last four months – and the performances of the back four in general.

The clean sheet against Leeds was, particularly, one to be savoured, especially as Town blanked them at the Galpharm last season as well, when Holdsworth headed the winning goal.

“I am happy with the way things are going for myself, but as captain I’m more happy about the team as a whole,” he said.

“From my own point of view I probably don’t push on quite as much as I used to because the gaffer wants me to support from behind, which is understandable when we’ve got players like Lionel (Ainsworth) and Anthony (Pilkington) who have got the pace to get past players.

“It’s a slightly different role to the one I used to have but I’m comfortable with it, it’s working well for the team and there always seem to be options for us when we are in possession, with the two widemen, the forwards and Gary Roberts always making his runs in the hole. That makes him very difficult for any team to pick up.”

On the defensive side, Holdsworth added: “We’ve got players in the squad with a lot of higher-level experience and when you look at last week, the back four were fantastic.

“We play the game for clean sheets and to support the midfield and the forwards and I thought we did it really well against Leeds.

“I think we’ve been a bit unlucky with some of the goals we’ve given away of late, but we’ve been making the Galpharm a fortress and hopefully we can now capitalise on that by replicating the results away from home.

“By defending like we are we create a solid base for the whole team and the longer we can keep it going, the better for our chances of pushing on and the better for the fans.”

Holdsworth paid tribute to highly-rated teenage keeper Alex Smithies – and offered him some advice.

“Alex has been fantastic for us because he’s a great shot-stopper and he comes for crosses all the time, and his performance against Leeds was absolutely top class,” he said.

“We keep having a word about his kicking, which he’ll get right, but his concentration is good.

“There has been a lot of talk about his contractual situation and people suggesting he might leave in the summer, but he needs to forget all that, get his head down and play as well as he can for the team.

“Credit to him, he’s doing that at the moment and, hopefully, he will sign for us, keep playing at League level to really establish himself and continue his career with England.”