Bradford 4 Bristol R 1: Handsome win sees Bantams finally lift themselves into the play-off places

This was their fourth win in an unbeaten run of five matches – a sequence that has lifted them into seventh place. They are coming into form at the right time.

They made the positive start their position in the table demanded as leading scorer Nahki Wells fired them into a 2-0 lead after 22 minutes.

Wells, who saw his left foot shot rebound from the cross bar in the first minute, put City in front after six minutes when Garry Thompson took the ball off Lee Brown on the right and found Wells unmarked to head home in the six yard area.

Rovers might have equalised seven minutes later when Oliver Clarke – a substitute for the injured Danny Woodards – took advantage of a mistake only for Jon McLaughlin to come quickly off his line to block the shot.

Wells scored his second goal – and his 21st of he season – from the penalty spot in the 22nd minute after Ricky Ravenhill was tripped by Fabian Broghammer.

McLaughlin stopped a point-blank header in the 28th minute from Tom Hitchcock before Bradford went 3-0 ahead in first-half stoppage time through defender Andrew Davies’s looping header.

The visitors, unbeaten in their previous five matches, pulled a goal back five minutes after the interval through Hitchcock.

But Garry Thompson restored Bradford’s three-goal advantage after 58 minutes.

Bradford City: McLaughlin, Darby, Davies, McArdle, Meredith, Thompson (Atkinson 77mins), Ravenhill, Jones (Doyle 72mins), Reid, Hanson, Wells (Connell 81mins). Unused substitutes: Duke, Hines, Nelson, McHugh,

Bristol Rovers: Mildenhall, Smith, McDonald, McChrystal, Brown, Anyinash (Richards 71mins), Woodards (Clarke 13mins), Norburn, Broghammer, Brunt, Hitchcock Unused substitutes: Lockyer, Harding, Gough (gk), Patterson.

Referee: T Harrington (Cleveland).