ON-LOAN midfielder Asa Hall will be staying at York City until the end of the season, despite parent club Cheltenham initially signalling their intention to recall him.

Hall will now be eligible for the Minstermen’s final nine league fixtures of the campaign, as well as the May 21 FA Trophy final against Macclesfield.

His continued presence at Bootham Crescent also persuaded City chief Gary Mills not to reinforce his midfield before today’s 5pm transfer deadline.

“We’ve agreed with Cheltenham that Asa will be with us until after Wembley, which is good for us and him,” Mills declared. “They wanted him back, but we’ve managed to keep him after a lot of talking.”

Alex Whittle, meanwhile, is also expected to be back in contention for the trip to Dagenham following his hamstring problems, while City’s squad is set to be further bolstered with the anticipated returns to training of Yan Klukowski (thigh), Matt Fry (medial ligaments) and Lanre Oyebanjo (knee) next week.

City have now only lost two of their last 19 games, but remain five points from safety and, ahead of the trip to Essex, Mills insisted there must be no let-up in the bid for survival.

“We’re on a good run and have got to keep believing and can’t get complacent, because there’s a lot of hard work to do still,” he explained.

Mills believes fourth-placed Dagenham will adopt the “win-or-bust” attitude that has seen them only draw four games, compared to the third-bottom Minstermen’s 15 this season.

In fact, the visitors have only lost two fewer league games than their hosts, with Mills adding: “They go out to try and win games and, if they don’t, they often end up losing as they set up very attack-minded.

“Our downfall has been too many draws and we should have won half of those games, but I still believe those points can come in handy at the end of the season and, when we got promoted, we had 14. We will still be going there to win though and we know we’re capable of doing that.”