Harrogate Town manager Simon Weaver remained upbeat despite Saturday's 3-0 defeat at home to Blue Square North promotion hopefuls AFC Telford.

"In the first 20 minutes we had a couple of great chances," Weaver told BBC Radio York. "I thought we could get in and upset them with our pace.

Goals from Sean Newton, Damian Reeves and Andy Brown left Town just one point above bottom club Vauxhall Motors.

"It's not all downbeat in the changing room at all," Weaver added.

"We're on the back of two six-pointers where we've won against relegation-threatened teams, and we've taken a lot of heart out of that.

"This was a game where it would have been a bonus to beat Telford.

"I don't think the performance was quite as good as we've recently managed to achieve, but there aren't as many negatives as the scoreline suggests. Telford will admit they have been in a battle."

Town's survival hopes rest on catching the cluster of clubs between seven and 11 points above them, over whom they have games in hand.

And Weaver knows that the next two games, home and away against one of those clubs, Gloucester City, will be critical in terms of their chances of escaping the drop.

"As long as the lads are positive about the outlook, I think we'll be OK.

"We've got to be warrior-like if we want to come out of these next two bruising games with the points tally we want."

Weaver will be without suspended pair Peter Knox and Martin Foster for the first of the Gloucester games, on Tuesday night (23 February). And that might tempt him into the loan market.

"I might have to reinforce the team in the next couple of days," he admitted.

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