Bradford City's latest crisis leaves them heading into the festive season with no recognised strikers.

A deal to keep Delroy Facey at the Bradford & Bingley Stadium fell through leaving City starting a stretch of four matches in ten days with no one to lead the line.

Ashley Ward is struggling to recover from injury and with loan striker Facey returning to Bolton yesterday, Law's options up front are limited to say the least.

"It is just one kick in the teeth after another," said Law, who is desperately scouting for an emergency stand-in.

"This is the worst time of year to be looking for someone to bring in. No one is going to be willing to let anyone go over Christmas with so many games coming up.

"I guess I might have to try and call in a favour or something like that. It is not looking great."

Ward, who last appeared at Brighton on November 2 when he suffered knee and ankle injuries, is set to miss out on Saturday's trip to Watford, while fellow striker Danny Cadamarteri is said to be "miles away", leaving Law with little, if any, options for the trip to Vicarage Road.

"The Facey thing is off," said Law, whose striker crisis is just the latest problem to plague him during an uncomfortable first year in charge of the cash-strapped Bantams.

"This leaves us with no recognised strikers here. We are going to have to go for a makeshift forward line.

"I will look around for players but this is not a good time so we may have to make do with what we've got.

"I'll have to look carefully at the options but it doesn't look great - we'll have to produce something from our squad, that is all we can do."

With a long-awaited victory on Saturday over Nottingham Forest, and much talk around the club of 'turning the corner', it is

unfortunate timing for the Bantams, who are about to enter the busiest section of the footballing calendar.

"These things happen, that's football for you. We will find a way of dealing with it, we have to," said Law.

Winger Andy Gray is expected to once again act as a makeshift striker with a reserve player coming in to join him if Law cannot pull off a festive miracle.

Facey, who first began to make an impact while at Huddersfield, played six games in his month at the Bradford & Bingley Stadium including scoring on his debut in the dramatic 5-3 defeat by Wimbledon.

Law was keen to keep the striker but the Bantams were unable to secure a deal with the Premiership side, leaving Facey to return to the Lancashire club.