DESPITE Gary Mills’ insistence that his side’s play-off chances are not dead and buried, it might take an Easter miracle now to resurrect York City’s top-five dream.

Defeat at Darlington means the Minstermen must rely on fifth-placed Fleetwood not winning either of their final two games and Kidderminster, in sixth, taking less than four points from a possible six.

Even then, City will also need to fulfil their side of the bargain by beating Cambridge United this afternoon and, in all likelihood, runaway champions Crawley in their own backyard on Saturday.

Mills’ men enjoyed a brilliant Good Friday when Kidderminster overcame Fleetwood to give City an opportunity to move level on points with the Lancashire club by winning at the Northern Echo Arena But the visitors were undone once more by a poor afternoon in front of goal, with midfielder Neil Barrett and frontman Leon Constantine the biggest culprits.

Barrett, as effective as anybody in the City squad at ghosting into the penalty box, unfortunately could not provide a decisive finish to match his intuitive runs on Saturday, failing to open the scoring with two excellent headed opportunities in the first half.

Former Port Vale and Leeds United striker Constantine also did not capitalise on two similar chances and, sadly, has not really justified his selection ahead of Michael Rankine for the last two matches.

Brought in to provide goals due to his commendable strike-rate in a City shirt, the experienced 33-year-old forward has failed to deliver at the most inopportune time of the season.

The lowest goal return of any side outside the bottom eight of the Blue Square Bet Premier certainly needs to be addressed during any post-mortem of the club’s fortunes in the 2010/11 campaign.

A short and perhaps long-term solution to the problem, however, might lie in making sure that more of the chances created by the team fall to the feet, or on to the head, of master marksman Jamie Reed.

One method of facilitating that would be to employ him more often in a central attacking role, either with or without a striking partner given the City boss’ penchant for 4-3-3.

When asked to operate on the flanks in a three-pronged attack, as he was on Saturday, Reed also expends a lot of energy chasing back to help out his midfield and defensive team-mates.

As a consequence, after a bright start to the match, the former Bangor City forward, still building up his stamina and fitness levels following a New Year move from the Welsh Premier League, seemed to flag somewhat in the second half at Darlington, which further nullified the visitors’ greatest goal threat.

At the other end of the pitch, Mills fielded three left-backs, by trade, in his defence, handing Jamal Fyfield a first start since November at centre-half alongside James Meredith.

With David McGurk, Daniel Parslow and Chris Smith all unavailable, the unlikely partnership represented a telling snub for Greg Young, who had been recalled from his loan spell at Altrincham but, in truth, has never looked comfortable in a City shirt.

Meredith and Fyfield certainly repaid their manager’s faith with accomplished performances and no blame could be attributed to either player for the two home goals – conceded within the space of three second-half minutes.

Earlier, City dominated the majority of the first half after the considerable forehead of Paul Terry, brother of England captain John, had called Michael Ingham into a smart second-minute save down to his right. Seconds later, Reed went close from 25 yards before the same player exchanged passes with Constantine and delivered a cross that Barrett headed over from four yards.

Reed then converted at the far post following Ashley Chambers’ deflected right-wing cross but had strayed offside and was denied his tenth goal for City by the assistant’s flag.

On 19 minutes, a sweeping move involving Andre Boucaud, Jonathan Smith and Chambers ended with an overlapping run and cross by Liam Darville, which home ’keeper Sam Russell could only palm out on to Constantine’s head.

Russell, though, recovered to catch the City striker’s tame attempt on goal.

A Chambers corner, flicked on at the near post by Constantine, then presented Barrett with another free header six yards out but Russell pulled off an acrobatic save to tip over the former Ebbsfleet midfielder’s effort.

Darlington ended the half with a bit more promise as Tommy Wright flashed an edge-of-the-box shot wide on the counter attack and Aaron Brown went close with a deflected free-kick.

Barrett blazed over a left-footed volley from 15 yards following Darville’s cross early in the second period before the latter survived a scare at the other end of the pitch.

The City right-back sliced a clearance over Ingham but raced back to the goal line to make an overhead clearance that cannoned wide off Jamie Chandler’s ahead.

Amazingly, referee Paul Hodskinson made the latest in a series of baffling decisions when he initially awarded a corner only to be corrected by an assistant standing 70 yards away from the incident.

City did fall behind on 53 minutes when Chris Moore sped past Chris Carruthers on the right flank and sent in a cross that found Liam Hatch at the far post.

Hatch’s header back towards goal was then nodded over the line from a yard by Wright.

The visitors should have levelled two minutes later when Darville’s cross landed perfectly on the head of Constantine but his attempt was a comfortable height for Russell to push over the crossbar.

In the next attack, the Quakers doubled their advantage when Brown’s free-kick was only cleared as far as centre-back Ian Miller who, after the ball had dropped out of the sky, swung a leg and thumped a 15-yard full volley past the stunned Ingham. “I don’t think he’ll ever score a goal like that again,” laughed home boss Mark Cooper afterwards, but nobody was smiling in the City ranks.

The visitors eventually recovered to mount a late rally with Rankine heading over from an 83rd minute cross by fellow substitute Peter Till.

Four minutes later, Chambers’ corner clipped Darlington defender Greg Taylor’s head and fell to Carruthers who fired in a low left-footed shot from ten yards.

Carruthers then headed another opportunity at Russell from Darville’s cross in stoppage time but the assistant’s flag had been raised for offside in any case.

City must now hope for assistance of their own from the likes of Barrow and Rushden today.

Match fact

Darlington 2 (Miller 53; Hatch 56), York City 1 (Carruthers 87)

York City: Michael Ingham 7, Liam Darville 8, Jamal Fyfield 7, James Meredith 8, Chris Carruthers 7, Andre Boucaud 7, Neil Barrett 7, Jonathan Smith 6, Ashley Chambers 7, Leon Constantine 7, Jamie Reed 7.

Subs: Michael Rankine 6 (Constantine, 62), Peter Till 6 (Smith, 62), Levi Mackin (Boucaud, 78). Not used: Greg Young, Will Hatfield.

Key: 10 – Faultless; 9 – Outstanding; 8 – Excellent; 7 – Good; 6 – Average; 5 – Below par; 4 – Poor; 3 – Dud; 2 – Hopeless; 1 – Retire.

Star man: Meredith – another mature display at centre-back – unflappable and combative.

Darlington: Sam Russell, Paul Arnison, Ian Miller, Greg Taylor, Aaron Brown, Jamie Chandler, Paul Terry (Aman Verma, 75), Marc Bridge-Wilkinson, Chris Moore, Liam Hatch (Phil Gray, 90), Tommy Wright (Michael Smith, 78).

Subs not used: Danzelle St Louis-Hamilton, John Campbell.

Booked: Bridge-Wilkinson 18, J Smith 58, Arnison 58, Darville 74, Chambers 77.

Shots on target: Darlington 3, City 5.

Shots off target: Darlington 4, City 6.

Corners: Darlington 2, City 10.

Offsides: Darlington 0, City 4.

Fouls conceded: Darlington 15, City 14.

Referee: Paul Hodskinson (Lancashire). Rating: awful, shocking and rubbish.

Attendance: 2,966 (1,003 City fans).

Save of the match: Ingham’s early stop was as good as anything Russell was forced to deal with.

Shot of the match: The quality of Miller’s goal will have been matched by few defenders in 2010/11.

Head to head: Jamal Fyfield v Liam Hatch

The former Maidenhead left-back proved his versatility again with a determined display at centre-back.

Recovering from a nervy start in which he lost his footing a couple of times and took an extra touch when he might have been better advised to put his boot through the ball, Fyfield settled down to win his aerial battle with target man Hatch.

The former Barnet striker did claim an assist for Darlington’s first goal but had drifted by then to the far post, where he outjumped the unfortunate Liam Darville.