Sittingbourne defender Gavin Hoyte on the Brickies’ Isthmian South East promotion hopes and being reunited with former Lincoln City team-mate Joe Anderson

Defender Gavin Hoyte is confident Sittingbourne have what it takes to get promoted this season.

The Brickies are firmly in contention after winning nine and drawing two of their 11 Isthmian South East games since Reece Prestedge took charge.

They’ve been frustrated by a series of postponements - last weekend’s match at Erith Town the latest to be called off due to a waterlogged pitch - and have dropped to sixth place.

But they’re set to return to action this Saturday (3pm) with a Swale derby on Faversham’s artificial surface at Salters Lane and have games in hand to potentially go second.

Ever-present Hoyte, who joined from Folkestone last summer, has seen the Brickies excel under Prestedge, the club’s former assistant boss, who returned to Woodstock as manager after Ryan Maxwell moved on to Welling three months ago.

“It’s always a strange one when a new manager comes in but I think what helped is Prez being in before as assistant manager, so a lot of the boys knew him,” said Hoyte, 35.

“He’s changed a few things and it’s crazy, we’ve had two draws and the rest wins. You just want to keep that run going.

“Everyone’s on it. It’s not the biggest of squads but everyone’s clicked, everyone works hard, there’s no big egos, and if someone makes a mistake, everyone’s there to back them up.

“We’ve got the players, the staff, even the fans, to push us over the line.

“We’ve just got to stay on task, keep doing what we’re doing at the minute and you never know where it can take us.”

It was a case of friends reunited for Hoyte when Prestedge named Joe Anderson as his assistant manager.

The pair were team-mates at Lincoln in the 2010/11 season, with right-back Hoyte on loan from Arsenal, while left-back Anderson had joined the Imps