DEFENDER Danny Holmes is convinced that Newport County AFC can steer clear of relegation under new manager John Sheridan.

New boss Sheridan picked up a point with a home draw against Exeter City just a day after replacing Terry Butcher last week.

His first away game in charge of the Exiles is at Mansfield Town on Saturday afternoon.

And Holmes, who suffered relegation with Tranmere Rovers in the last two seasons, believes there are enough signs to suggest that County will climb off the bottom of League Two and beat the drop.

Asked if his new side can get out of trouble, Holmes said: “Yeah, definitely. It’s only early in the season so I think we’ll be fine.

“Not much has gone for us and we’ve had injuries but everyone is back now so we’ve got a much stronger squad to choose from.

“We can’t look too far ahead – we need to look at the teams in the five places above us and once we get there we can look further up.

“You can get quite disheartened by some of the results because I feel we should have a lot more points than we do but I think we’ll be fine.”

Butcher paid the price for a return of only five points from ten league games and Holmes says the players have been impressed with Sheridan’s impact.

“The transition has been quite quick really,” said the 26-year-old right-back.

“In football you’ve got to move on quickly. The manager came in the day before the game last week and we just had to concentrate on the game.

“This week now we sort of know the way the manager wants to work and the way he wants us to play so it’s been good.

“I’ve been through quite a few managers in my time and you obviously want get to know their ideas and hopefully work with them long into the future.

“He’s got different ideas to what Terry had and I think we performed really well on Saturday so it shows that it did work.”

And Holmes is unconcerned about a run of fixtures against Mansfield, Portsmouth and Wycombe Wanderers – all currently in the top six.

“Any team in this league can beat anyone and if you’re playing people higher up in the league you naturally just pick yourself up for those games anyway,” he said.

“I’m sure we can go on a good run now.

“Matt Taylor has been a big miss for us,” he added. “He’s got great experience and he’s a bit of an old head – he talks really well and we’ve got a good understanding as a back four now.”