Altrincham v York City

With three successive league defeats having severely compromised their seemingly fading play-off hopes, the visitors will be desperate to reverse that trend and get their season back on track.

However, with a number of other results actually going in their favour in midweek, York are certainly not out of it, and currently find themselves only a single-point behind fifth-placed Kettering Town.

Manager Martin Foyle was issuing a rallying call ahead of the trip to Greater Manchester, reminding his charges that their eventual destiny is still very much in their own hands.

“There’s a lot of doom and gloom at the moment but the play-offs are still very much within our grasp," he told The Press. "We have got to keep fighting and the players know that.                                                                                                                            David McGurk returns for York

“There have been some individual mistakes but we’ve got to get on with it because we are all in it together. We’re expecting a difficult game at Altrincham – there are no easy ones in the Conference and people need to understand that – but we will be able to get the ball down and play on their pitch.

“We are looking forward to that and then we’ve got two crackers against Mansfield and AFC Wimbledon and I would prefer to play those teams up there with us at the moment.” 

Foyle also revealed that he made a couple of enquiries in the loan market this week, but unfortunately without success.

“I’ve tried to bring a couple of players in but we haven’t been able to get them here," he said.

“There is still scope in the budget to do that though as we have worked around it well. It would be good to freshen things up because we need better at the moment.”

But at least there was significantly good news for him on the injury front. Centre-back David McGurk is expected to return to the side after a knee injury ruled him                                            Chris Carruthers - Misses out

out of the midweek home defeat to Salisbury City, while skipper Danny Parslow and midfield enforcer Levi Mackin are similarly recovered, having been restricted to the bench by minor knocks. On the downside, Chris Carruthers (ankle) has joined Alex Lawless (hamstring) in the treatment room.

Hosts Altrincham have much severer problems in terms of selection after their skipper Tom Kearney suffered a double break of the leg against Wrexham in midweek. He has become the second of their players to be ruled out for the rest of the campaign, joining former Rochdale and Halifax left-back Matt Doughty on the sidelines, while striker Dale Johnson is similarly missing with knee ligament damage. Midfielder Robbie Lawton is also rated very doubtful after turning his ankle at the Racecourse Ground.

Manager Graham Heathcote could therefore decide upon a change in formation, with veteran ex-Crewe Alexandra front-runner Colin Little returning to partner fifteen-goal one-time Scarborough hit-man Chris Senior in attack.