HEAD coach Paul James says he will not let Worcester Wolves’ BBL Trophy ambitions distract his players from pushing on in the British Basketball League.

Just two days after taking on Newcastle Eagles in the first leg of the semi-final, Wolves go up against bottom club Manchester Giants at the Lucozade Powerleague Sports Dome tomorrow (6pm).

The last time Wolves completed a league and cup double-header was last month when they saw off Bristol Flyers in the Trophy before losing 94-85 to Cheshire Phoenix in the league.

And James said he did not want to see a repeat of that as they aim to close the gap on second-placed Leicester Riders and leaders Newcastle.

“After playing Newcastle, we have got to focus our attention on Manchester as it is going to be another tough game away from home,” he said.

“We still have desires to finish as high as we possibly can in the league and to win as many games as we can.”

Wolves have won the last three meetings between the two sides, including a 87-72 victory earlier this season.

But Giants have won two of their last four league games, beating Plymouth Raiders and Cheshire Phoenix.

James added: “They have won games, so it is not like they are the whipping boys.

“Right now they are going through a bit of a slump but they are not a team we can take lightly.

“When we played Surrey, they had only won five games all season long but we had to beat them in overtime.

“That was certainly a wake-up call for us because we now know we have got to treat everyone with the same respect.

“Manchester have got absolutely nothing lose, so I expect there to be a full crowd and it to be very noisy.

“It is not a fantastic place to play and it is very intimidating, so we have just got to go up there, do what we do and hopefully that will be enough to get the win.”

Giants have been integrating new power forward Dzaflo Larkai.