McCall still hopeful of play-offs

Last updated : 25 January 2010 By BBC Sport

McCall told BBC Radio Leeds: "As a professional footballer you have to always aim high and believe you can achieve things.

"You always have to be confident and we just need our luck to turn a little bit and once than happens it will be OK."

Saturday's 2-1 reverse saw the West Yorkshire club drop to 16th, putting more pressure on McCall.

"These are hard times for us but we have too many good professionals at the club to just give up," the former Bradford midfielder explained.

When you've been out for so long you worry if you'll ever come back as the same player, but his performance has shown none of us have to worry about that

Stuart McCall on Omar Daley

"We need to start defending better as we conceded another two poor goals here at Lincoln.

"I expected us to be higher at this stage of the season. I wanted three wins from the next four games before this one. So now we need to win the next three games if we are to stay in the play-off hunt.

One positive for McCall at Sincil Bank was the performance of winger Omar Daley.

The Jamaica international completed his first minutes of first-team football in 11 months after a serious knee ligament injury.

"Omar is one of those players that on his day is a match winner on his own. He was excellent and I'm really pleased for him," McCall said.

"I thought he'd only last about 60 minutes but he got better as the game went on and was a constant danger.

"As he gets fitter and regains his confidence he'll get better and better.

"When you've been out for so long you worry if you'll ever come back as the same player, but his performance has shown none of us have to worry about that."

Source: BBC Sport

Source: BBC Sport