Connacht head coach Pete Wilkins says he has an idea how many games his side need to win to secure a top-eight finish in the BKT United Rugby Championship, but will be keeping that information private for now.
The province return to URC action this weekend following their disappointing 39-24 defeat to Benetton in the quarter-final of the Challenge Cup on Sunday.
Connacht have Italian opposition again this week, with Zebre visiting the Sportsground on Saturday night.
Wilkins' side are in a battle to make the play-offs and secure Champions Cup rugby next season.
Two defeats in their last two URC games have left them 10th in the table, although just five points separates them from the Stormers in fifth.
The province face the bottom two sides in the coming weeks, with this weekend's game against Zebre followed by a meeting with second-from-bottom Dragons, before they finish off the regular season with difficult games against Munster, Stormers and Leinster.
"I do, but I wouldn't share it at this point," Wilkins (below) said, when asked if he had a required number of wins in mind that he believes would secure a play-off place.
"The only reason for saying that isn't because I don't want to be brave and ambitious in terms of setting targets but because the landscape can change so quickly.
"I think it's so tight, particularly around those spots, fourth to eighth and then us few teams sitting below that. Week to week that's going to keep adjusting.
"I know what we need to get out of Zebre, I have an idea out of Dragons and we'll see where we are after that.
"I know certainly some of the teams we're competing with have some tough trips to Africa coming up and some tough fixtures outside of that as well.
"We need to get into that top eight and we think we can."
The province have struggled for consistency all season, with six of their seven wins in the URC coming in two different three-game winning runs.
Losses to both Benetton and the Lions in March were followed up by an impressive win away to Pau in the Challenge Cup, before an error-ridden display back at Benetton when they returned for their Challenge Cup quarter-final last week.
And while Wilkins says they were frustrated with their performance in Italy on Sunday, it doesn't take away from their win in France a week earlier.
"I think that the performance over there earned us a right to have a go in the quarter final.
"We're disappointed with the result. Benetton deserved the win, the pressure they put on us and some of the errors we made on the back of that, they thoroughly deserved it. I'm disappointed we didn't play better, I'm disappointed we're not in the semi-final, but it's not detracted from the Pau performance.
"I'd always much rather be fighting on two fronts, but it does narrow the focus. I means we can probably be a little more selective around the week-to-week use of players, we're not trying to balance across as many games and we get a clear idea of what we need to do.
"Once we processed some of the elements of the performance against Benetton in the changing room over there in Italy after the game, talk quickly turned to the URC and what we want to achieve there this season, but also the importance of setting ourselves up to be playing Champions Cup rugby next season as well," he added.
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