Marcus Bignot is hoping a bumper crowd can inspire Chester to an all-too-rare home win on Good Friday against fellow strugglers Torquay United.

Chester’s terrible home record has seen them win just four times at the Deva since December 2016, a miserable run which has seen fans begin to vote with their feet, resulting in the club’s lowest home league attendance since reforming in 2010 for the recent 2-0 defeat against Dover Athletic.

In a bid to get the crowds back in for what is simply a must-win fixture for the Blues, adult tickets for The Harry McNally Terrace have been slashed to £10 for the Bank Holiday clash with the Gulls (3pm kick-off), while Under 16s can claim free admission if they download a ticket application form from the club’s official website.

Bignot’s side are currently nine points adrift of National League safety and with just seven games remaining, relegation looks the likely outcome for a team who have only managed to win six matches all term.

“The important thing to say is the fundraising is going great and the club have moved the bar once again,” Bignot said, with the club’s supporters having raised over £100,000 to bail Chester out from their current financial crisis, avoiding a second insolvency within eight years.

“It’s now important we get supporters through the turnstiles because it has a massive impact and as a manager we’ve felt that impact in terms of the budget.

“I know it’s about results, and results will bring supporters back. But if they are seeing a group who are giving everything to the cause win, lose or draw, they will respond.

“There’s only four players coming out of the first-team playing budget so for them to keep coming week-in-week-out, it’s hard to keep going again if we keep losing, but just get behind us, come what may.

“There were a lot of our fans down here (at Sutton) and they’ve seen them give everything to the cause and it’ll be the same again on Friday. Torquay are someone we need to pull away from, and then Macclesfield on the Monday.”

Left-back Jordan Gough travelled with the squad to Sutton United on Saturday for the first time since mid-January owing to an ankle problem but Bignot is hopeful the former Solihull defender will be available before the end of the current campaign.

“Unfortunately, injuries have prevented us seeing Jordan Gough on a regular basis,” Bignot added.

“I’m constantly asking Kath (Hopwood, physio) when is he back? I brought him to the club because he was going to key for us.

“The group we’ve got now, there’s more balance, depth and competition to the squad than we actually inherited and if you look at the circumstances that’s testament to them.

“Although we haven’t got Jordan we’ve still got players who are doing a job to the best of their ability and I’m dead proud of them in the way they are competing.”