GARRARD FURY AT ROTTEN DISPLAY

GATESHEAD ended a run of four straight defeats by thumping a dismal Boreham Wood side who seemed to be already on their holidays.

Goals from Wes York and Luke Hannant gave the Heed an early lead, before Manny Smith and Jamal Fyfield completed the rout late on.

“We were nowhere near it today,” Wood boss Luke Garrard raged to The

NLP. “If you were a fan or an outsider looking in, you’d think we were at terminal 3 waiting for a flight. You had two teams, both on awful runs of form, and Gateshead looked like they wanted to get out of it and we looked like we wanted to stay in it.”

“It’s been a long time coming,” said relieved Heed boss Neil Aspin. “We showed everyone what we are capable of today.”

Gateshead were two up inside the opening 16 minutes. York grabbed the first with a fine solo effort. The midfielder crafted a chance out of nothing by lifting the ball over David Stephens with one touch, zipping past the defender and hitting a great volley from 20 yards that flew into the top right corner and left home keeper Grant Smith rooted to the spot.

Then a mix-up between Stephens and Joe Devera allowed Hannant to hit a pile-driver from just outside the box that flew into the bottom left corner.

Wood never looked like getting back into the game and conceded another two late on. A corner from Hannant was met by Smith, who headed in. The icing on the cake came in added time – centre back Fyfield picked up the ball unmarked on the edge of the box and fired in from distance.

“We need to get out of this rut as soon as possible,” said Garrard, whose side have now lost five of their last six and are away to Chester on the last day of the season.

“Losing can become a habit and we’re going to struggle next season if we play like this.”