MAEL de Gevigney is pleased with his 55-game run of successive starts and believes Barnsley can use Saturday’s visitors Birmingham City’s big-spending approach as motivation to beat them.

The French centre-back has played every minute of Barnsley’s last 55 league games, since September last year. It is the longest such run by an outfield player since Nicky Eaden in the 1990s.

Mael told the Chronicle: “I am very happy to be fit and my body is feeling good. I am trying to help the team.

“55 games is a lot but I want to do as much as possible and never stop playing.

“Honestly that is what I want because I know I can do it. The managers in that time have trusted me because, every time, I try to do what they are asking me and I work hard every day.”

The next visitors to Oakwell, Birmingham, smashed League One spending records in the summer when they shelled out about £30million on a new squad. De Gevigney said: “It’s a strong motivation for us when you are playing a team who have spent a lot of money because they want to beat the league easily.

“We have to show them that it’s not the only thing in football. We will show them our strength on Saturday.”

Jay Stansfield cost a reported £10million and plays on the left of Birmingham’s attack so is likely to come up against Barnsley’s right-sided centre-back de Gevigney.

“I don’t really focus on the players.

“I focus on how we can play. He’s just a human like me, whatever the price.

“I don’t mind it.”

On Barnsley’s late loss at Wrexham on Tuesday, de Gevigney said: “It was a tough one – a late goal against a good team away after pretty decent performance. It’s a bit frustrating but we need to stay positive. We have been playing pretty well, creating chances.

“But the results are not as good as we want. We have a lot of games coming so we need to stay positive.

“We are dominating some games. Sometimes we don’t have the efficiency in games but it will turn for us.”