ADAM Hinshelwood hopes York City can take confidence from their fightback to draw 2-2 with Notts County in their final home pre-season friendly.

County took an early lead after Harrison Male had been penalised for handling a back pass, with Jodi Jones blasting the resultant indirect free kick into the top left corner.

City did have their chances, with Marvin Armstrong a whisker away from striking Dipo Akinyemi’s lay-off into an empty net but found themselves further behind on the stroke of half time after the impressive Alassana Jatta had beaten the offside trap before firing past Male one-on-one.

But the Minstermen were a side transformed after the break as they took the game by the scruff of the neck.

Billy Chadwick superbly halved the deficit with a curling effort from the edge of the box with 56 minutes played before setting up Ollie Pearce to level the scores, but despite Akinyemi seeing an effort brush off the outside of the post, a winner proved elusive for the hosts.

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Though the City boss believed his side had perhaps done enough to win the match during the second half, he hopes that they can take confidence from the way that they fought back against their Sky Bet League Two opponents.

“It would have been nice to win for the lads’ confidence, but I’m hoping that they took a lot of confidence from that second-half display,” said an upbeat Hinshelwood.

“It’s very easy when you’re getting the run around like we did in the first half and just want to cave in, but they didn’t, they kept going, and I think it was a real sign of just how far we’ve come in a such a short space of time.

“I just thought it was an unbelievable game to be fair.

“Notts County, they’re probably one of the best teams that we’ve faced here and their aspirations this season will be to do very well in the league above.

“To see what confidence those lads got from scoring quite early, I thought we took the game to them in the second half and our press was a lot better, it was aggressive, there were times when Callum Howe was almost a right winger.

“But that’s how I want us to be, I don’t want teams to come here and take games, someone wants to be pressing them on the front foot. I think that’s what the fans are demanding from us as well.”

Dan Batty was withdrawn in City's only substitutionDan Batty was withdrawn in City's only substitution (Image: Tom Poole)

City named just 16 players and only made one substitution, with Ricky Aguiar replacing Dan Batty with just over an hour played.

Explaining the decision, Hinshelwood added: “We’ve ticked off that box for a lot of the players now to get 90 minutes.

“We’ve still got one or two with niggles, but we’re hoping that they’ll be back for Southend in two weeks’ time, which will give us some options.

“But all the lads that are playing can do is try to keep hold of that shirt.