FOLLOWING their Knockout Cup semi-final loss at the hands of White Horse FC earlier in the month, Ben Hogg’s Division Two table-toppers Holt FC went head-to-head with their rivals for a third time this term.

And a 5-0 victory for Holt saw them land the title from the White Horse men, who need to win their two remaining matches if they are to pip Heytesbury to the runners-up spot.

In what was an evenly matched first half, Holt managed to gain the upper hand when Andrew Donald gave them a 1-0 interval lead.

The second period saw Holt raise their game and they managed to fire in four unanswered goals as they coasted home.

Natty Mills doubled his teams lead and a delightful free-kick from Zack Manna made it 3-0.

Manna took his tally for the season to 36 with his second of the game when he made it 4-0 from the penalty spot and a first ever goal for the club from Aaron Cockerill completed Holt’s five-star display.

Heytesbury finished their season with a hard fought 2-0 victory over Calne Eagles.

They will now be hoping that White Horse will drop points in either of their two remaining matches, which will see the villagers finish as runners-up and gain promotion to Division One.

However, if Horse can gain victories in their matches against United FC and Calne Eagles, they will pip Heytesbury to promotion on goal difference.

In a windswept match, Heytesbury took the lead through top marksman Leigh Kennedy, who followed up to tap in after Andy Windsor had saved his initial header from a Declan Griffiths. 

Calne played their part in the first half and probably should have scored themselves when Brett Cullen struck the ball wide with the keeper to beat.

In the second half, Leigh Kennedy struck again to score his 36th goal of the campaign, which means that he finishes the season having scored over half of his team’s total tally of goals.

Bradford United Reserves have given themselves a chance of staving off relegation from Division Two after they defeated United FC 4-3, whose loss means they are now in the drop zone

But with three games remaining, they could well yet climb to safety and avoid relegation along with Worton & Cheverell, whose battle to stay up was lost earlier in March.

In what was Ross Hatter’s last game in charge of Bradford, his players gave him the perfect send-off.

They got of to a flyer and opening the scoring on 10 minutes through Scott Mitchell and things got better when Tim Bruton doubled their advantage.

Arkadiusz Jedrejewski halved the deficit for United before further goals from Lee Ridout and Owen Dixon put Bradford 4-1 ahead at the break.

United gave themselves a great chance of getting something from the as goals for Josef Zapotoczny and Michal Zuber got them to within the odd goal but although they pushed forward looking for an equaliser, they came up just short as Bradford held on to claim a vital three points.