The two blues produced one of their best performances of the season against the high flying Lithgow Panthers during a 4-2 defeat and will be keen to take that hockey into a home game against Lithgow Zig Zag.

Souths coach Chris Stafford said player changes make the battle for improvement hard but there's signs of increasing cohesion with each game.

"We moved the ball around well which was the main thing," he said of last week's loss.

"Unfortunately we'll have a few players out this week so it's back to square one again.

"There's some players moving around this week so it will be interesting to see what happens once we're out there."

Souths' 3-0 win over Zig Zag earlier in the season was far from impressive for the Bathurst squad.

Stafford said it's not a match worth reflecting on, for the fact that both his side have improved and the lineup for each club will be vastly different.

"I'm not sure what they're going to dish up on Saturday. You often get mixed reports from different games. Some weeks they're right up for it and other weeks they're not," he said.

"We played terrible last time against them. We came away with a win but it was nothing to write home about.

"There's not too much to think about from that last game and the team's completely different this time around. From what I understand it's the same for Zig Zag as well. It's hard to pick exactly how they'll play.

"We've really struggled to score goals throughout this year so we've made a few changes up front to be a bit stronger up there. We really need to find some mongrel in the circle."

The ladder situation adds to the tension for Saturday's game.

Souths are a win behind Bathurst City and Confederates in the battle for the remaining finals spot, and the two blues' negative point differential adds to the pressure.

Souths play host to Zig Zag on Bob Roach Field from 1.50pm.