Peterhead manager Jim McInally is hoping they can secure their League One status when they face East Fife tonight.
The Blue Toon have three fixtures left and require one more point to ensure they remain in the third tier.
McInally’s men are currently seventh in the table and with eighth-placed Dumbarton and ninth-placed Clyde meeting at the weekend one more point would mean Peterhead would be safe because they couldn’t be caught by both the Sons and the Bully Wee.
It has been a challenging season with the start delayed until October, a two-month shutdown from January to March, a hectic fixture schedule after returning and no fans at games.
With all that taken into consideration McInally says he would be pleased to come through it still in League One and with a platform to build for the future.
He said: “We’re looking to get more than a point, but that’s what we need.
“It would mean a lot if we can stay up because this season has been unique.
“There’s been the discussions about the play-off and the Highland and Lowland Leagues not playing enough games.
“Is 18 games enough games? What is enough games? I don’t think 18’s enough and I don’t think 22’s enough to determine champions and relegation.
“But we need to live with the decisions that have been made and for us having had a young team this season it will be good to come out the other side and hopefully build on that for next season.
“There’s no doubt it’s been more challenging than any other season.”
East Fife were supposed to be in action against Clyde on Tuesday night, however, the game was postponed following a positive Covid-19 test in the Bully Wee squad.
That could alter how this season ends with League One and League Two required to all have played their 22 games by next Thursday.
Clyde v East Fife could be rescheduled for next Thursday, but if that doesn’t happen then the final standings would be decided on a points-per-game average after 18 games.
McInally added: “We’ve got three games to play in five days and we just need to negotiate that as best we can and then leave these other things to sort themselves out.
“If it goes back to 18 games then we’ll be OK anyway. Football-wise it has been a decent season, but as far as the rest of it goes it’s just been shambolic.”
Peterhead faced East Fife at Bayview on April 17 and lost 2-1.
The Blue Toon had been leading 1-0 courtesy of Hamish Ritchie’s goal but after Andrew McDonald’s red card midway through the second period goals from Danny Denholm and Scott Agnew gave the Methil men the points.
McInally added: “We’ve been there recently and we know how tough it is. They’re a good side who are unbeaten at home in the league.
“We know we need to do better at set pieces and we’ll see if we’ve learned any lessons from the last game.
“But by the same token we’re not wanting them to stop pressing and getting tight to the opposition.
“It will be interesting to see if there has been any lessons learned.
“There will be changes to the team as well so it will be interesting to see how people do.”
Jason Brown is suspended while Ryan Conroy, Alan Cook and Gary Fraser are still injured.
