The Rocks have endured a faltering and frustrating start to their Isthmian South Central division campaign after being relegated last season but have enjoyed a mini-resurgence of late.

That revival has seen them pick up four wins from five games providing an injection of confidence as they go into Saturday’s league clash with Kingstonian at Chichester City’s Oakland Park.

And they do so on the back of a 3-0 win on the road at Southall thanks to goals from Preston Woolston, Cal Laycock and Lee Seok-Jae. Howell says he has seen enough in his squad to suggest that his outfit can put behind them their dismal form earlier in the season.

The victory at the SkyEx Community Stadium — home of Hayes & Yeading — where Southall play their home games, came through a resolute mindset to put behind them the 4-0 midweek loss at home to Moneyfields, says Howell.

He told Rocks Radio’s James Powers: “Bognor are a massive club and I have been fortunate to be here a long time; the fan base is brilliant and it is a proper football club and the club will take its place as a top club in Sussex and that will happen over a period of time, hopefully sooner rather than later.

“I think that I was always confident that they players we had and the ones that we decided to bring in could help get us out of such a poor spell, one of transition, and I think that it is fair to say we can see the shoots of recovery and that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a lot of hard work to get through still — and we very much intend to do that.

“The defeat at home to Moneyfields was a bit of a head-scratcher for me really because I thought we were okay in the first half but then came the 4-0 capitulation in the second half and that was hard to take — there were a few reasons for that, a few tired legs and we hoped to freshen it up against Southall and credit to the players I thought it was a really good performance.

“Preston’s early goal gave us a little bit of confidence but I thought we went a little bit too long in the game it was only when we scored the third that we looked entirely confident; we have still got lots to work on but overall it was very pleasing.

“We got a reaction after the defeat and we weren’t at our best but the work rate and desire was excellent. Billy Allcock was outstanding, and there were lots of good performances — we are so pleased for the travelling fans against Southall and it would be good to replicate that sort of form at home.”

Meanwhile, Bognor hope to head back to Nyewood Lane in mid-December once the new 3G pitch has been laid after ground sharing with Chichester since the start of the season.