Halstead sunk further into relegation trouble as they were convincingly beaten by a resurgent Diss side.
With just three games remaining before this one, Shaun Bailey's team knew that they desperately needed something to pull them away from the teams below them, who all have games in hand.
But it was a disappointing show from a weakened Halstead side, who were outclassed in every department.
The only plus point for the men from Rosemary Lane was that all the other relegation contenders lost.
Halstead started the game looking bright but Diss settled well and went two goals up before half-time, the first coming against the run of play and the second on the stroke of half-time.
Best chances of the half fell to Steve Wareham, twice, Andy Tudor and Mark Farmer but their shooting was poor.
Halstead continued to battle hard but real goalscoring opportunities proved few and far between.
Two goals in as many minutes eventually sealed Halstead's fate.
And it was left to Farmer to grab a late consolation goal for the visitors.
Halstead, who remain 18th in the division, must surely now get something from their last two matches, against Diss again and Harwich, to survive.
Manager Bailey said: "A few of the players will have to take a good look at themselves. We played really well for the first 20 minutes but for the rest we might as well have not been on the pitch.
"But we would rather be where we are then where some of the other teams are - we won't be panicking."
Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.
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