Midweek blow for Bradford City was not 'fatal' to League Two play-off hopes insists Graham Alexander

That’s the message from Graham Alexander, who is mindful that an open race for the final top-seven place has a good chance of going down to the wire.

To stay in that race, City must secure a positive haul of points in back-to-back home games with Mansfield Town and Notts County, that said.

On the play-off picture, the Bantams manager, whose 13th-placed side are seven points adrift of the side currently occupying the last play-off place in AFC Wimbledon, with two games in hand, said: “It’s not fatal. It was disappointing on (Tuesday), but we made it extremely difficult for ourselves.

"But it is only fatal if you imagine it to be and allow it to be in your own mind.

"If you have a positive outcome and you see nothing but opportunity in front of you, then you have a chance of creating opportunities and that’s how I see it.

“That’s certainly inspiration for us and there’s no teams that are putting in massive long runs of form over 10 to 15 games to suggest that we can’t be one of those teams competing for the play-offs come the end of the season.

"But there’s a lot of work in front of us.”

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Critically, Alexander is also adamant that the belief is still there among his side, beaten just once in their last seven games.

He continued: "If there wasn’t belief that we were competing for something this season, I think it would almost be a shrug of the shoulders.

“I’ve never sensed that with this group since we came in and the team were 16th or 17th. I’ve never felt the players as a team or individuals have given up on anything.

"We certainly haven’t as a staff. We still have a lot to fight for.

"Even if we win our next three or four on the bounce, we’re still going to be in a tight situation where the pressure is on to win the one after.

"I hope that pressure is there for us right to the last game. If it’s not, I don’t think we’ll be in the picture we want to be in."