One of the most important Western Premier League games of the season will take place on Thursday evening, with the second-placed Dubbo Bulls taking on the ladder leading Macquarie United.
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For the Bulls, a win could mean the difference between playing finals or not after the third placed Lithgow Workmen chased down the fourth placed Barnstoneworth earlier in the week, while Macquarie will be able to cement their grip on the minor title with a victory.
The Dubbo sides have both carved out the spots amongst the revamped competition's best sides and will again get the chance to take home bragging rights during Thursday night's clash at Hans Claven Oval.
In an earlier meeting, Macquarie came out on top in the cross-town derby, clattering the Dubbo Bulls 5 - 2 in one of the biggest match-ups of the season thus far.
Bulls coach Jason Schink said the next few days would be 'crucial' for his side.
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"Tomorrow night's really make or break for us, we've only got two games left and then our final round bye, so that's just two more opportunities to get points, and against the top two teams," Schink said.
"The next three days will pretty much decide whether we play finals or not, so there's a lot of pressure on us to get results."
Despite being second placed, a loss to Macquarie or elsewhere and a strong run from the other top ranked teams could see the Bulls bounced out of the finals race entirely, something which Schink acknowledged.
"It's all on us, we put ourselves in a good position at the start of the year, but we've slumped this past month, too many draws and too many losses," Schink said.
"We had gained a bit of separation, we had a four point gap from third and then we got knocked off by the bottom ranked team."
Schink says that slow starts like the one against Parkes that proved costly have been a thorn in the Bulls side for a while.
"It's been an issue for a while for us, the last couple of years at least, this year, our wins we've scored early and put them under pressure and our losses have just been terrible for the first twenty minutes," Schink said.
It's an aspect of the game that the Bulls are hoping to avoid on Thursday night.
"A big problem we had last time, we gave Connor Crain too much time in the mid-field, if you give him time with the ball, he'll pick you apart," Schink said.
"We had no ball pressure, we tried something new and it didn't work in the first half, by the time we figured it out, it was too late."
Macquarie and the Bulls will meet at 6.30pm at Hans Claven oval.
