DELIGHTED Chris Brass reckons York City are primed to make a concerted strike for the play-offs after a 1-0 win over Doncaster Rovers.

In front of City's biggest home crowd of the season, the Minstermen brought a run of seven matches without a victory to a halt while also bringing to an end Rovers' six-match winning streak in the league.

The three points, courtesy of Darren Dunning's 60th-minute penalty, moved City just one place up the Division Three table to tenth.

However, they are now just one point off the play-off zone as the important Christmas period and half-way mark of the season draws close.

"I think we are showing signs of maturity," enthused Brass.

"We are a young side but we are starting to learn and we are being a bit more professional in our approach and I think that is why we ended up as 1-0 victors.

"It was going to be a battle and we showed an awful lot of commitment.

"Our work-rate was tremendous and if we can continue as we are doing confidence will grow.

"You have to stay in contention and a loss might just have seen us drop into mid-table and then a gap starts to appear between ourselves and the play-offs.

"It is now looking promising. We are in striking distance of the play-offs and if everybody is fit I know we have a decent enough squad to keep us in contention.

"We can now regroup this week and look forward to going to Leyton Orient with confidence."

Brass revealed the action unfolded just as City had envisaged.

"Doncaster possibly shaded it in the first-half but we knew we would have to put up our defences early on," he explained.

"They were on a tremendous run of six wins in the league and are a good, well-organised side.

"We knew we would be on the defensive to start with in the first-half but we could then take them on in the second.

"I think we shaded the second-half and took our chance when it came. Darren was very cool with the penalty. He struck it tremendously well and was under some pressure."

SATURDAY'S crowd of 5,942 was City's biggest home gate since February when Hartlepool United were the visitors to Bootham Crescent for a match broadcast live by Sky.

However, Doncaster Rovers fans made up almost half Saturday's attendance.

With the visiting fans totalling 2,925, the match attracted just 3,017 home supporters.

Updated: 12:32 Monday, November 17, 2003