PAOLO Di Canio has acknowledged that only Swindon can determine their ultimate destiny this season and backed his players to cope with the pressure of being the League Two leaders.

An eighth successive league victory on Tuesday night moved Swindon back to the top of the standings, and with winnable home games against Accrington and Burton coming up, they have the chance to further strengthen their hold on first place.

However, there were perhaps some indications that the level of expectation weighed heavy on the players’ shoulders against the Shrews, with Town far from at the best for a good hour of the encounter.

Di Canio accepted that the squad may have wasted a lot of their energy prior to the game thinking about what was at stake, but now they are in first place the Italian is confident they will cope with being the side that every other team in the division now wants to shoot down.

“We battled for seven months to reach this position, so I don’t see them now becoming worried to stay there,” he said,.

“They maybe felt a bit of pressure before the Shrewsbury game because they used all their energy thinking about the situation before the match, but that moment is gone and we got the win.

“But I don’t think they will feel the pressure and I don’t believe they will underestimate Accrington tomorrow either.

“Nobody else is going to give us a gift, not even Accrington. Only we can decide this game and our future.”

Accrington are a side out of form at the moment and will travel to Wiltshire on the back of three successive league defeats under new manager Paul Cook.

The Lancashire side are 11th in the standings and have a lot of ground to make up to reach the play-offs as they trail seventh place Oxford by seven points.

While they look increasingly likely to be set for a mid-table finish this season, Di Canio believes they will still show plenty of fight at the County Ground.

“Accrington will want to prove they have quality both individually and collectively against the top sides,” he added.

“For sure they don’t fight for everything, like the title or against relegation, but they will fight because they want to prove that they have passion and they will fight because they want to prove to their new manager they have quality.

“They might also be fighting for a new contract so there are many reasons why they will fight tomorrow.

“So we have to be careful, we have to manage our passion and our anger if we want to win.”

Swindon have 16 games remaining to secure promotion back to League One, and Di Canio feels six wins from the next 10 games will put them in a very strong position to achieve their target.

“We are in a short tournament now,” he said. “We all know that if we are going to win five or six of the next 10 games then we will be very close to going up.

“It has been a fantastic moment in terms of results and in the way we have played.

“If we can keep going then we will do something more than special, something close to unique.”

Joe Devera could come back into contention, having missed the last two games with a toe injury, while Simon Ferry is understood to be fit again after suffering from a bout of flu in recent weeks.