STEVE Watson has called for everyone associated with Darlington to "stick together" as Quakers look to address and fix their struggles at home.
Darlington's 1-0 home defeat to Chester on Tuesday night was a sixth successive National League North loss at Blackwell Meadows, their worst ever run at the ground.
Watson's side ended last season with four straight home defeats and have now gone down to Worksop and Chester at home in the early weeks of the current campaign.
Quakers are on their travels this weekend when they take on Harborough Town but Watson knows his side need to get back on track in their own back yard sooner rather than later.
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"If you're going to be a team that wants to compete you need to be a good home team," he said.
"But it just seems a bit edgy. I get it, this is not where Darlington fans want to be, but this is where we are and we need to roll our sleeves up and stick together.
"We need to embrace playing at home but we're away on Saturday so that's the next one I'm thinking about."
Ma’Kel Bogle-Campbell scored the only goal just before the hour mark on Tuesday night.
It was a third successive win for Chester, who top the National League North table, and Watson wouldn't be surprised to see them stay there.
He said he couldn't fault Darlington's effort but felt too many of his players had "off nights", particularly in attack.
"Chester are a very good side and they'll be in and around the top three or four I think and have a very good chance of winning the league," said Darlington's boss.
"They have some very good technical players and we worked really hard to stop them.
"We defended crosses really well but our key passes were poor. We thought we'd have a chance of getting down the sides and we did - I think we had 16 crosses - but our quality wasn't good enough. And if you don't take your chances it's going to be tough.
"I said to the lads I can't question their endeavour but the quality wasn't there.
"It's one of those nights where all of our technical players probably had an off night, and you're going to struggle to get back in the game when that happens."
Darlington have scored just one goal in their first two home games of the season, and Watson said: "I think we need to gamble more.
"All the top goalscorers are just as happy to get a five yard tap-in. It was one of those nights where everyone had an off night with the quality.
"There were still some good performances and we defended well, but you can't win a game if you can't put the quality together in front of goal."
Darlington won at Bedford on Saturday and Watson is looking for another good showing on the road this weekend.
He said: "I thought our first [home] game, certainly the first half, we were unrecognisable. We went toe to toe with them tonight, the quality was just lacking.
"On Saturday we created a lot of good things and had a really gutsy win.
"We have to pick ourselves up, we'll do the work we need to on Thursday but it's tough because we see so little of them.
"There's no point in feeling sorry for ourselves. I think the vast majority [of fans] get where we are and it is tough to compete with clubs like that.
"We're disappointed but we know we're not a million miles away and we can go on Saturday and hopefully bring some points back."
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