Paul Hegarty believes League Two has been split down the middle.
And an Angus derby win against Arbroath this afternoon is the first step for Montrose to bridge the gap from the bottom half to the top.
“Over the last few games the league has changed,” said Hegarty. “Before that you could have thrown a blanket over all the teams.
“But, at the moment, we’ve got two leagues of five.
“Hopefully we can get a couple of wins to get closer to the group above.”
The 3-0 victory over the Red Lichties back in August provides the template for Montrose today.
“We played really well that day,” he recalled.
“But they have beaten us as well, and there’s only a point between us in the table, so it’s fairly even.”
He added: “The Annan and East Fife games were encouraging but last week at Elgin we huffed and puffed and didn’t cause them too many problems.
“We played better after they took the lead but I want us to play better from the first whistle.
“I know how important the derby is to our fans. I could see that from the day I arrived at Montrose.
“Whether it’s Manchester United against Manchester City, Rangers against Celtic, Dundee United against Dundee or Montrose v Arbroath, a local derby is always a big deal.”
The long-term injured players are all still unavailable for Montrose.