Bully blasts unfit players

Steve Bull blasted his Stafford Rangers players' lack of fitness as the relegation trapdoor opened wider with last night's 5-1 thumping at Grays Athletic last night.

Three goals inside the first 27 minutes left a 26th Blue Square Premier defeat of the season a formality at the New Recreation Ground to sink Rangers to the brink of relegation.

That could be mathematically confirmed after Saturday's trip to Northwich, with Stafford currently 17 points adrift of safety with only 21 to play for.

Stafford can get a maximum of 40 points while the three teams immediately above the drop zone all currently have 36 points each.

Rangers keeper Danny Alcock was just about the only player to emerge with any credit last night and he alone may well have kept the margin of defeat down to single figures.

Boss Bull said: "It was abysmal to be fair. The players are just not fit enough overall. They're either not good enough or fit enough. To me they're not fit enough.

"It took them three goals to get going. You can't do that as you'll lose every game otherwise."

Rangers battled in the second half, with substitute Damion Jarrett finding the net, and Bull acknowledged the improvement.

"They did alright in the second half," he said. "They battled well and I thought they were going to get back into it. But when you are 3-0 or 4-0 down you can't.

"It's hard to do that. But at least they showed a bit of passion in the second half."

Stafford make the short trip to Northwich on Saturday when relegation can become a virtual certainty.

"We will get the players in on Thursday and go through a few things we did badly last night and see how it goes."