Toolstation NCEL Division One
Selby Town manager Christian Fox
Christian Fox has admitted the aim of reaching the play-offs looks like mission impossible for his Selby Town superheroes.
The West Riding County Cup runners-up were a dead cert for the top six in February. Bad weather has derailed their momentum and even though they have games-in-hand, Fox agrees the gap between them, Hallam and Glasshoughton Welfare appears too great.
“It is looking like a tall order,” Fox told Non League Yorkshire.
“But we’re not going to keep up, we’ll keep fighting. Mathematically it is still in our hands with the game-in-hand, but it is going to be hard.
“We have the right characters around so we’ll keep going. Personally I think you always would take the points rather than the games-in-hand.
“Glasshoughton have put themselves in a great position and Hallam are still there. They have the points in the bag which means we find ourselves in a position where we’re going to have to win all our games.
“We don’t giving up though. People wrote us off at the start of the season, but we always maintained that we wanted to go for promotion or make the play-offs. Looking at the position we were in for the majority of the season, we should be up there.
“Looking back if we don’t get in the play-offs, it will be a disappointing season. It has been in our hands for a lot of the season.”
Fox, hailed as the club’s Messiah in December, has transformed Selby’s fortunes and he is on the brink of guiding them to their highest placed league finish since 2012. He also took them to their first County Cup since 1993.
So it was no surprise when it was revealed on Wednesday morning that Fox had been offered a long-term contract to stay at the club.
“I’m delighted to have committed to the club and I love it here,” he said.
“We have a great coaching team and a great set of lads which we will add to in the summer.
“For a first season we have done alright and we’ll be looking to build on it next season.”
Fox was not present during the 3-2 defeat to Grimsby Borough on Thursday night as he was serving the final match of a two game stadium.
He has spoken to his assistant Jonny Bruce, who said the Robins were poor in the second half. He also heard about referee Michael Brownsett’s shambolic display.
“Apparently we did really well in the first half even though we did not create many chances,” he said.
“Our goalkeeper (Chris Barrott) made some decent saves and by the sounds we scored two quality goals. Obviously we went in 2-0 up.
“Two-nil is always a dodgy score-line and by all accounts we didn’t switch on in the second half. Apparently we were poor.
“According to some the referee also made some poor decisions and it was apparently the one we had when we played Knaresborough. Apparently he gave Grimsby’s penalty before the lad’s even hit the deck which is disappointing.
“There were some other dodgy decisions, but I can’t comment on them as I wasn’t there.”
Selby are away at Ollerton Town on Saturday.