Harrogate Town have 'been in far worse situations and come out the other end', insists Simon Weaver

Saturday’s 2-1 derby defeat to Bradford City means that the Sulphurites have now taken just one point from the last 21 on offer in League Two and condemned them to a seventh loss in eight matches in all competitions.

That sequence of results, which has seen them score only twice and draw a blank on six occasions, leaves the Wetherby Road outfit 20th in the table and hovering just above the relegation zone.

Thus, even at this early stage of the 2022/23 campaign, it would appear that a long, hard season of scrapping to retain their Football League status is on the cards.

But, Weaver insists that there is no panic within the Harrogate camp.

"The stats are concerning because you don’t want to carry that run on, we want Football League status and to be pushing on, but much bigger clubs than us are on similar runs and you’ve got to balance it a bit with all the change in the summer, with new lads coming in, and keep taking stock, but also keep going,” he said.

"It’s a resilience game and it always has been since I jumped over the fence 13 years ago and found an overgrown pitch and one player on the books. It’s a game of resilience and I’ve got that and I’ve been in far worse situations than this and we’ve come out the other end.

"Saturday’s performance was another level and the last two home games, against Salford and Bradford, we’ve looked a top-half team, just missing that little bit of confidence. We’ve got good players, some of whom are just starting to emerge and bed in.

"But, obviously we want results, and we need results to stay at this level, however we are only just into October, so we’re not pushing the panic button. We are just looking at our recent performances and thinking ‘actually, we probably could have got a lot more points out of the last five games’.

"But, we haven’t, so we have to keep taking the hits and keep getting up again until we get it right.”

On what he and his players need to do to get themselves out of the rut which they are currently in, Weaver added: "We can't feel sorry for ourselves.

"It's merciless this level of football. All we can do is cut out the noise and just believe in ourselves.

"It's about how much we believe in ourselves and how much we trust the players and back them while also pushing them and demanding from them - and I think that will see us through.

"We have to communicate with the players in the right way, gone are the days when managers are smashing tables up in the dressing room like it was when I played, we've got to show them, we've got the video footage.

"It’s about helping them understand what this club is about, that the success we’ve had has been built on intensity, energy and honesty. We have to show them what we want from them and bring that out of them.”