BOSS Carl Heeley insists survival remains Worcester City’s sole objective despite showing top-10 form since the start of September.

City sat bottom of the pile with two points from seven matches at the end of August but have since climbed to 13th in National League North.

Saturday’s 1-1 draw at Gainsborough Trinity coupled with a late victory for third-from-bottom Bradford Park Avenue left Worcester within four points of the drop zone at Christmas.

But, having displayed their battling qualities to survive spells of pressure at Northolme, Heeley has faith in his squad to achieve their primary goal.

Reflecting on City’s form, Heeley said: “We signed a lot of players late in pre-season and were unearthing problems in games you normally discover in the warm-up matches.

“There has been a huge turnaround in form and we have been playing relatively well on a consistent basis. We have been competitive.

“The first aim is to get enough points to secure our status and if we can do that we will look to finish as high as we can.

“I’d love to finish in the top half but that will be tough. I would be very surprised if we made the play-offs but who knows? One team usually have a run and that could be us, we are certainly capable.

“But lets not get ahead of ourselves. The aim was always to stay up.

“We have some great lads, they are an honest bunch and all we ask of them is to give everything they have which they do.

“If that’s good enough for the play-offs, brilliant. If it’s good enough to stay up, great but the main thing is we are all giving our best. Our destiny will be what it will be.”

City were slow out of the blocks at the start of both halves but then bossed the latter stages in Lincolnshire, leaving their manager with mixed emotions.

“There was a slight disappointment over how we started each half,” he added.

“Gainsborough had their best spells at those times but I didn’t think there was too much in the first half.

“The referee apologised for missing a stonewall penalty and we have to accept that happens.

"He is making a snap decision and fair play to him for owning up to it. I told him not to worry, some you get, some you don’t.

“We had enough of the ball and good situations to have won without that. We’d have taken a point beforehand but on balance we probably deserved to win.

“Gainsborough hung in there and were happy with a point in the end. The ball was taking a long time to come back on, they were clinging on.

“On another day it might have been a more positive result but there were some good performances out there. I am happy.”