John Hendrie column: Saturday’s trip to Cheltenham may feel like a bonus game with the play-off place sorted.

And I can understand Phil Parkinson thinking about resting a few players. You’ve got to do what’s right for individuals.

If somebody goes into the game with a niggling injury and makes it worse, then you’re out of the play-offs.

It also gives the likes of Nathan Doyle and others who probably haven’t been involved for a few weeks a run-out.

That’s important because you don’t know if they will be needed later on.

But collectively you’ve still got to go there and keep the current momentum going.

When City played weakened teams in the JPT and FA Cup, those guys came in and were still effective because the club were going well. They need to do that again.

When I was at Barnsley, we clinched promotion with a game to spare. We spent the next week partying and went to Oxford United on the last day and got turned over 5-0.

We weren’t focused and our approach was all wrong. It was a really flat way to finish.

City are really striding into the play-offs at the moment and you don’t want to lose that. They could be facing Cheltenham again the next week so psychologically it’s very important.

If you get beaten by the odd goal then fair enough, providing you have given a good account of yourselves. If you put in a bad performance it sits with you in the mind for a few days even with the change of personnel.

Play-offs are all about being mentally strong because there is so much at stake. You don’t want to jeopardise that.