BRADFORD Town made a scintillating start to their 2019 fixtures in the Toolstation League Premier Division with a 5-0 thrashing of visitors Cadbury Heath at the weekend.

Charlie Maddison gave the Bobcats an early lead at Trowbridge Road before Jamie Lyons made it 2-0 at the break.

Barely a minute of the second had passed before Wayne Thorne's side increased their lead through Martin Lenihan.

The hosts then pulled further clear in the closing stages though efforts from Jacob Sloggett and Will Hailstone.

Bradford go on the road to Shepton Mallett this weekend.

Elsewhere, Westbury United joint-boss Neil Kirkpatrick opted not to be harsh on his side following their 2-1 loss against title rivals Bridgwater.

Kirkpatrick’s troops lost only their second game of the season as Jake Brown and Jake Llewellyn netted in the first half for the hosts, ensuring Westbury dropped to third in the division – now three points behind leaders Willand.

After losing out to county rivals Bradford on Boxing Day, it could be presumed that Westbury are starting to hit a lull following their near faultless start to the season, which saw them put together a 17-game unbeaten run.

But Kirkpatrick insists a drop in form is far from the reality, and instead praised his side for delivering one of their stronger performances of the season against Bridgwater – despite leaving Somerset without any points.

He said: “It was a game that they had to win (Bridgwater) or they were out of the running.

“We travelled with six players missing, and we were fantastic to be honest – I thought we dominated the game and played them off the park in the first half.

“We didn’t get the rub of the green in terms of decisions and bounce of the ball – every tackle and bounce seemed to go against us.

“I told the lads at half time that they were playing fantastic and told them to keep up their efforts, and they did.

“They had two shots in whole game, but we defended fantastically well.

“It was probably one of our best performances of the season. If I was to be really harsh, I could say we didn’t take our chances.

“But our lads have been so good all season up front so I’m not going to start criticising them.”

Westbury return to action this weekend to tackle struggling Roman Glass St George, who have won only a quarter of their opening 20 fixtures.

With the title race set to be contested by the division’s current top six, Kirkpatrick insists his men will continue to go about their business in no different way to how they have approached the first half of the season.

He added: “We didn’t turn up on Boxing Day (against Bradford), and that massively disappointing that we didn’t turn up for a derby game.

“We’ve played 20 league games and 10 others, throughout that time the boys have been fantastic.

“And there are few clubs that would’ve thought that we would be up there.

“In my opinion it’s now a four-horse race for the title, and we are fourth favourites.

“We’ll keep going about our business, and if we continue to play how we did on Saturday we will win games. We have played a lot worse.”