DORCHESTER Town boss Craig Laird says his side only have themselves to blame as their relegation battle is set to go to the wire.

The Magpies drew 1-1 with Basingstoke Town, meaning they need to pick up at least a point at Stratford Town on Saturday to guarantee safety, something which has frustrated the manager.

He said: “It’s in our hands, but we’ve no-one to blame but ourselves for being in this situation. We’re going to have to turn around the form book and save our best away game for Saturday.

“There’s nothing better than having it in your own hands, it means you can’t blame anybody but yourselves

“If we go down it’s because we don’t deserve to be in this division. Lots of things have gone wrong which should have been taken care of before now.

“There have been lots of big decisions in the league which have added up over the season, but those lost points would have been massive to us.

“We could have put it to bed at Cambridge. We played poorly but should have come away with a point, and if you add that to the points that we gave away with Toby Down’s red card, that’s five points we’ve given away and we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

However, Laird was pleased with the spirit shown by his side to secure a draw against a strong Basingstoke side.

He said : “I think the nervous energy reached some of the players in the first half.

“But I think we came out like a different team in the second half. We set ourselves up slightly different and it was only us who was going to go on and get the equaliser and a possible winner.

“Based on the two halves a draw was probably a fair result.”