Raith captain keen to stay for second attempt at promotion

Board meetings are being held today to discuss the future of manager Barry Smith, while his players, the majority of whom are out-of-contract, are also waiting to discover their fate.

The fall-out started immediately after Saturday's play-off defeat to Alloa as chairman Alan Young handed in his resignation, calling time on his three-and-a half-year spell at the helm.

Benedictus, who missed the majority of the campaign with a broken leg, is hoping to remain at the club for a second attempt at escaping the division.

"I've not spoken to anybody yet, but that's my contract up, like most of the boys," he said.

"I'm sure it will take a couple of weeks before people get spoken to.

"Of course, I'd like to stay. I've been here a few years now, and getting into the Championship top four in the first year was a positive, but the last two have been disappointing.

"I want to play a part in getting this club back into the division it wants to be in because, realistically, we should be in higher league than we are."

Raith's play-off exit followed on from the setback of failing to clinch the league title on the final day of the season in front of 4400 fans at Stark's Park last week.

"Ourselves and Ayr were favourites and it went right to the wire," Benedictus said.

"What happened last week maybe took the stuffing out of us for these two games, but I thought there was a lot of effort, we just couldn't get the goals when it mattered.

"It's not promotion, but it's not been a bad season - we just missed out with one game to go and Alloa have been our bogey team this past week.

"The is the first time we've been beaten at home all year. The away form has not been good enough throughout the whole season. It was the same the year before and it's cost us.

"It's heartbreaking for the fans and we know how much it means to them.

"All I can say is that it hurts us as players as well, but as a club we need to pick ourselves up, and whoever is going to be here next year, we need to go again."