Having endured a relegation battle that went to the final day of last term, York City goalkeeper Michael Ingham is hoping the team’s back-to-back wins against Morecambe and Dagenham & Redbridge can act as a platform for the 17th-placed side to avoid the same fate this season.

The brace of timely triumphs followed a run of 11 games without a victory for City.

Said Ingham: “Before we beat Morecambe, we had been playing well and people were saying the wins would come but the gaffer told us he was sick of hearing that and rightly so. The last two performances have been different class though and the work-rate has improved.

“We’ve got Northampton next and it was tough there last season but we got a 2-0 result and these two wins should build confidence a bit.

“Hopefully, we can go on a little run now because we don’t want the predicament of last season when we had to win games towards the end.

“If we get our wins now, we could be a bit more comfortable by the end of February or March and we want to be comfortable as quickly as possible.”

Ingham’s first game back after injury resulted in one of his busiest afternoons for the Minstermen as he pulled off a string of saves to help to secure a 1-0 win.

He was not as active during Saturday’s 3-1 victory over Dagenham and, of his two comeback appearances, Ingham said: “Against Morecambe, it was one of those days that could not have gone better for my first game back. Everything seemed to hit me and I made seven or eight saves.

“I definitely didn’t expect to be that busy and the second-half save from the header was probably one of the best I have made in my 300-and-odd games here. It was a bit quieter on Saturday and I probably needed to tidy up a bit better, but that will come because I have been out for seven or eight weeks.”

Ingham remains just ten clean sheets short of Forgan’s all-time club record of 120. He felt unfairly deprived of an 111th shut-out against the Daggers but was not too perturbed at the final whistle, saying: “I thought their guy was offside for the goal but it’s a stupid rule now with all the different phases.

“I was a little bit disappointed they scored but I have always said I don’t care about my clean sheets if we are getting three points week in, week out.”