MARK Bentley has conceded that his Canvey Island side will fail to bag a place in the Isthmian North play-offs come the end of the season.

A 2-0 defeat to Coggeshall Town saw the Gulls slip 14 points adrift of the top six.

And Bentley, who replaced long-term boss Danny Heale in the Canvey hot seat last October, admitted his side will struggle to overcome the points deficit.

“I’ve got to be honest and I’m not stupid so I have to say we won’t get in the play-offs,” said the Gulls chief.

“That’s just me being very honest and I asked the players last week ‘who wants to play for the club next year?’

“Hopefully I’ll be here. If we lose a couple more games then I might not be, but hopefully I’ve still got the backing from everyone and they can see what I’m trying to do.

“Some people are playing for their futures because I said to them ‘where do you go from Canvey Island?’

“There are not many bigger clubs in this league and if you can’t perform at this club then you are only going to go backwards.

“The players’ challenge is to earn their shirt for next season.”

The Gulls have suffered four consecutive defeats having originally made a flying start to the calendar year.

A fine run of form had seen Canvey move to within touching distance of the play-off places but a string of poor results has seen the club slip back down the standings into 10th place.

A five-match unbeaten run has been followed by losses to Aveley, Great Wakering Rovers, Tilbury and Coggeshall Town.

And Bentley admitted that Canvey’s current run of form is similar to at the back-end of last year, which saw the Gulls suffer four home losses on the spin.

“It’s looking like how we were pre-Christmas,” added Bentley.

“We looked like we couldn’t win two on the bounce or we were winning one and then losing one.

“At the turn of the year we were outworking sides and that’s why we went on such a good run.

“Obviously conceding late on against Aveley seems to have knocked us for some reason.

“We tried to be positive going into the game against Great Wakering Rovers. It’s a game we should be winning, no disrespect to them, but we just didn’t turn up.

“An accumulation of things has seen us getting back into that rut and we need to change that very quickly.

“Some new lads have come in and they need to settle in quickly, but they’re good players and I certainly think they will add quality.”