As Darlington prepare for this afternoon's crunch visit of Division Three basement boys Exeter City, caretaker boss Mick Tait has told his players now is the time to start knuckling down.

With ten games to go, Quakers sit just six points above the relegation zone and more alarming for Tait is that his side have claimed just one win from their last ten league games.

A similar statistic on their run-in would make things interesting - and scary - for a Quakers side low on confidence after two straight defeats in the last week.

"It's all our own doing and it's up to us to get ourselves out of it," said Tait. "It's another big game for us and we've got to go out there and make sure we win.

"We're at home and if we approach it in the right way we have the players to win it."

Quakers face an Exeter side rejuvenated under new boss Gary Peters after taking five points from their last three games.

With that in mind Tait expects another stern test.

"They've picked up a few points lately and they're going to be a very hard side to beat," said Tait.

After failing to take a single point from their last two games Quakers remain in deep trouble.

However, Tait remains upbeat about his team's chances of survival.

"After two defeats you find yourself getting sucked down towards the bottom but there's still plenty of teams who have a lot more pressure on them," said Tait.

"All it takes is a couple of wins and we're back up there. After the Hartlepool and York game we were looking towards the top half of the table.

"All of a sudden you lose two games in quick succession and it looks bad again."

Tait will be hoping to see a vast improvement after Tuesday night's defeat at home to Cambridge.

"We had a poor performance down at Bournemouth and a poor result on Tuesday," said Tait.

"Despite what everybody says I don't think we deserved to lose against Cambridge. We didn't play well enough to win it but we certainly shouldn't have lost it."

Quakers currently lie 17th in the table and while Tait protests that his side are in a false position, he admits they are where they are because of poor results.

"We shouldn't be where we are but the league table doesn't lie and we are down there because of our results," said Tait.

"There's hardly anything between the sides but the difference with teams at the top is that they take their chances.

"We haven't and that's what we must start doing if we are going to get anywhere. With the position we're in at the moment I'll take a couple of wins regardless of the performance."

Tait may hand a start to striker Jim Corbett after he recovered from a thigh injury.

The 22-year-old arrived on a month's loan from Blackburn two weeks ago but has yet to play after colliding with teammate Adam Reed in training.

"He's came through two days of training and says he feels OK so he'll be in the 16," said Tait.

Defender Stuart Whitehead is almost certainly out with an ankle injury and Quakers will be without defender Ryan Valentine, who serves a one-match ban after his sending off against Hartlepool. Gary Pearson, who returns from suspension is expected to fill in at right-back.

Glenn Cronin, Justin Walker and Carl Peteffer are all back after suspension for the visitors but ex-Darlington youngster James Coppinger (ankle), Chris Curran (knee) and Martin Thomas (groin) are all doubtful.

Read more about the Quakers here.