WITH just two games remaining, it looks certain our play-off quest will now go down to the wire.

With our last few results and performances we have not made it easy for ourselves - but we have never had anything easy this season and perhaps it was always going to be this way.

At the end of the day, I am still very confident we will get the right results, starting on Saturday when we entertain Exeter and then on May 3 when we travel to Oxford United.

People are talking of Saturday's Bootham Crescent game as a cup final, a must win, a make-or-break tie.

But taking both games into consideration, perhaps we can use them as a chance to gain experience for the play-offs should we get there.

Just like the play-offs, we have a home game and an away game to contemplate and we will need a result from both of them.

If we can achieve that then we will certainly enter the play-offs with confidence and at least a taste, of sorts, of what to expect in terms of pressure.

How we handle the pressure over the next two games will be of major significance.

But at least Exeter, who are in danger of dropping out of the League, are under immense pressure themselves and at least the pressure we are experiencing is the right kind.

I certainly know which end of the table I would rather be at.

Some supporters have suggested it would be better if Exeter arrived at Bootham Crescent on Saturday already relegated and with nothing left to play for.

I cannot agree and I'm glad we are playing a team that has something still to fight for.

Had they already been down, the pressure would have been off Exeter and with nothing left to play for they could have made it extremely difficult for us to get at them.

As it is, they still need to get something from the game and so it will be up to us to show we want the three points more.

Whatever the outcome of the next two games, it has still been a good season for us.

At the start of the campaign, had we been told we would be still in with a great shout of reaching the play-offs with two games to go we would have settled for that.

It must be remembered we have a lot of youngsters in the squad who are experiencing this situation for the first time.

As long as they learn from it then that can only be a good thing.

In my eyes, the biggest achievement to come from this season is the fact there is still a York City Football Club.

Everyone, the players and the fans, want to finish on a high but if we take a step back the real achievement has been in saving the club and anything else will be a bonus.

With that in mind, it was great to hear late yesterday afternoon that the Football League had approved the Trust's take-over of the club and agreed to transfer membership of the League from the old York City to the new club.

It would have been a travesty had all the hard work of recent months been scuppered by the League.

Now though everything is in place to take the club forward - hopefully all the way into the Second Division.

Updated: 12:04 Thursday, April 24, 2003