Darlington’S relegation could be confirmed tomorrow afternoon but manager Simon Davey will not share the pain felt by everyone else connected with the club.

The gaffer does not underestimate the impact that losing their League Two status will have on supporters and players following a dismal campaign and even labelled their imminent drop into Blue Square Premier League as “a minor disaster”.

But after joining the club only eight days ago Davey is more focused on building a bright future at The Northern Echo Arena rather than being distracted by its current travails.

Victory for fellow strugglers Cheltenham Town and defeat for Darlington at home to Accrington Stanley would end any hopes of Davey pulling off an incredible rescue mission.

However, Davey’s remit is all about ensuring that the club’s stay in non league is as short as possible and he will not share the blame once Quakers fate is sealed.

“Relegation? It won’t hurt me at all,” noted the Quakers chief. “For the club, it is a minor disaster to go down. A lot of the people have resigned themselves to the fact that the team is going down.

“If being relegated was going to hurt me I wouldn’t have taken the job. My focus is to get them back winning games and make sure they are right for next season so we have a really good go.

“If the miracle had happened and we’d won ten out of ten and stayed up then, fantastic we’d have a crack at League Two. It’s not mathematically impossible if we win all our remaining matches.

“But for me it’s about getting the team to compete and I can’t afford to become distracted by any doom and gloom.’’ Accrington travel to the North-East on the back of five consecutive league defeats offering Davey an ideal opportunity to register his debut home victory.

Mor Diop and Stuart Giddings both returned to training this week and look set to feature as the boss continues to use Darlington’s remaining games to assess his squad.

“It’s my job is try to make sure we win more than we lose and make sure we get the players ready,’’ he said.

“We have had a week at the club, we’ve assessed them. As a manager you ask yourself if you think individuals are the right players who can bounce straight back into this division next season.

“The ones that want to stay, and the ones that I want to stay, and the players we bring in for next season, must have a winning mentality.

“It’s my job to assess whether it’s a confidence thing, is it ability, is it fitness, is it the right player?

“Luckily for me I’ve got eight games to look at all that before the real business starts of getting us back in this division and I have to make sure when we kick-off the first game of next season we are fitter, stronger, quicker and with better players, so we’re more competitive.

“It’s a long time to August so there’s a lot of hard work!”