Deeping Rangers draw with Boston Town in the United Counties League

Deeping Rangers picked up another positive point in their fight against relegation despite being pegged back late on by play-off chasing Boston Town on Saturday.

Dan Dougill had given the Clarets a second half lead in the United Counties League Premier Division North match at the Haydon Whitham Stadium.

However, Matt Cotton equalised for the fourth-placed Poachers with six minutes remaining to leave Deeping still looking nervously over their shoulders at the drop zone.

The draw moved them above Sleaford Town into 16th spot but they are still only four points clear of the relegation places with five matches remaining.

Clarets boss Brett Whaley said: "It feels disappointing because we were 1-0 up but ultimately, if we had won, it probably wouldn't have been a fair reflection of the game.

"We have to take the draw as a positive because a point before the game against a side that is flying and in the play-offs is something that you would be really pleased about.

"We are pleased on the balance of the whole game but, when you get a goal up, you just hope that you can hold on and nick the win."

The match was played in testing conditions as heavy rain arrived midway through a first half where Rangers' best chance had fallen to Oleksandr Muzychuk who shot straight at the Boston keeper after Byron Adiado and Will Barnes had created an opening.

Deeping then made the first breakthrough nine minutes into the second period when a clearance from the visiting keeper fell to Dougill who smashed it first time from 35 yards to fly into the Boston net.

The goal sparked a strong response from Boston who made five changes at once to increase their pressure before Cotton scrambled home the equaliser.

Whaley added: "The conditions were difficult and it wasn't much of a spectacle - it was a proper derby.

"When you're down at the bottom like we are and you go ahead, we sank deeper and deeper and tried to defend our box.

"Fair play to them because they were brave and made five changes at once and pinned us back.

"You don't go on the run they've had and get yourselves into the top four without being a top side so they were always going to test us."

The draw means Deeping have lost just once in the last six games with Whaley hoping that run of form and endeavour from his players continues.

He commented: "We are where we are and what we have to do is make things very difficult for teams.

"We're at a time in the season where we've needed to turn a few results in. We've done that and have become difficult to beat.

"If we keep doing that then we'll give ourselves chances.

"We've got five league games left and we just need to keep getting points.

"I think that every game we go into we have to have an attitude where we don't go away with nothing.

"We don't want to hit a bad run of form now and we've got to give ourselves a bit of confidence.

"We've said that the next couple of games are tough but, if we can compete with Boston and the form that they're in, we can compete with anybody.

"We have to make sure that our mentality and work-rate continues because if you have 45 minutes where you're not right in this league then you end up on the wrong end of results."

Rangers travel to Hucknall Town on Saturday before a run of three successive home games against Newark Town, Shirebrook and Harrowby.