Garry Thompson insists City are not fighting a losing cause to make the top seven.

And the striker is confident of ending their run of draws with three points at play-off contenders Exeter tomorrow.

A third successive stalemate against Plymouth in midweek left City in 11th – still nine points behind Paul Tisdale’s Grecians. But they have two games in hand and victory at St James Park would put them back on course to close the gap.

Thompson was kicking himself for not taking the best chances in the 0-0 draw on Tuesday. He missed an early one-on-one and also hit the bar.

He said: “You’d think it would be easier to start hitting the net rather than the crossbar or the post all the time.

“But I should have scored in the first half. I gave the keeper ‘the eyes’ and if I’d lifted the ball I would have scored.

“That’s the fine line between winning and drawing unfortunately. I did wonder if I was offside but you’ve got to play to the whistle and that’s no excuse.

“I had another shot that hit the lad in the face that was going in and I’ve hit the bar again, so it’s just not dropping at the moment.

“It’s disappointing bec-ause it was another chance to move closer to the teams above us. But there’s no reason why we can’t go to Exeter and win.

“We should have won on Tuesday and it will be the same mentality, whoever the gaffer picks to play. We’ll keep a solid base but we know we can also hurt teams going forwards.”

City finish the season with four of their last five games against teams currently in the promotion hunt.

With three in a row at home after the Exeter trip, Thompson is looking to build up momentum to make sure that their run-in will matter.

He added: “We’ve got ten games left and a lot of them are at home so it’s important we get on a roll.

“As I said after York, if we can go the rest of the season without defeat then we can be up there. We’ve had a few draws when we should have won but that’s five unbeaten now.

“All we asked after the cup final was to roll up our sleeves, dig in as a team and keep fighting and we are doing that.”

City have not scored in open play since beating York 2-0 a fortnight ago. The only goal in the last three games was Alan Connell’s stoppage-time penalty against Aldershot.

They once again carved enough chances to have comfortably seen off struggling Plymouth but were left firing blanks.

Thompson said: “Everyone who’s watched the last few games can see that we’ve deserved to win but it’s just not falling for us in the box.

“When you’re away from home, your aim is to secure that clean sheet and try to build on that. We’ve defended well as a team but for some reason the ball’s not going in at the moment.

“You can look at the strikers and say they’re not scoring but we’ve had lots of corners. It’s a team thing, not just one or two individuals.

“Strikers get paid to put the ball in the back of the net but sometimes it falls for you, sometimes it doesn’t. These games happen and unfortunately it’s happening to us more frequently than we would like.

“Exeter is a massive game. We’ve still to play a lot of teams around or above us and we know we can take points off them.

“If we can get a win tomorrow that sets us up nicely. We’ve got three home games on the bounce then and with our crowd behind us, it’s a chance to push on again.”

Thompson reported no lasting effects from Guy Branston’s challenge on his knee which drew universal condemnation after the Plymouth game.

“It could have been a lot worse if my leg had been planted. I was fortunate to ride the tackle because I saw it coming. It was a definite lunge with no attempt to play the ball. In any other game, that would have been a red card.”