Depleted Lion roar on (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

Depleted Lion roar on

10:23am Monday 26th February 2007 in Football By Gazette Sport Reporter

BRITISH Lion OC kept their 100 per cent league record intact but they had to scrap for the two points against a dogged White Horse side who despite being at the basement put up a brave fight before going down 3-0.

The Lion were missing several key players and lost John Stockman just before kick-off, due to work commitments, but started brightly and could have taken the lead twice inside the first five minutes, but Rob Drown fired a chance wide and then somehow managed to sky his attempt from three yards over the bar.

The Lion eventually took the lead on 10 minutes when Shane Holloway scored his first goal for the club following a lung-bursting run from midfield which ended with him finishing well from 12 yards.

The Lion kept chipping away at their opponents, who offered little in the way of trouble to the Lion's back three who were superbly marshalled by the returning Darren Brown, and if it had not been for some outstanding goalkeeping from Paul Whale they would have romped away from the visitors.

A fine one handed save from Tom Evans' shot across goal was the highlight and the British Lion went in 1-0 up at half-time.

It was more of the same in the second half, with Luke Enderby hitting the post and Andrew Webster curling a 30 yard effort just wide, this after more fine work by stand-in goalkeeper Clive Black, who had taken over half way through the second half.

The Lion were getting frustrated but they finally got the all important second goal in the 80th minute. A lofted through ball from debutant Adam Bewley found leading goal scorer Webster on the the right side of the White Horse defence and he lobbed the ball over the advancing keeper from 10 yards.

With 2 minutes left Gerry Thompson drilled home a vicious shot from 30 yards to seal the win and preserve their unbeaten record.

Rowde remain on the heels of the leaders and their 3-1 success over AFC Calne was a massive victory for Kevin Whitbread's side who also remain unbeaten from their 11 games to date.

Paul Green's opener for Calne was wiped out by Jamie Mullens, whose shot on the turn was deflected home. Rowde's Marcus Wallen capped a fantastic individual performance when he flashed home a brilliant half volley from 12 yards on the hour mark to give Rowde the lead.

Wallen then outjumped Calne goalkeeper to nod the ball to Mullens who rolled the ball home for the third goal which gave them a 3-1 triumph and all but ended Calne's interest in the promotion race.

Sutton Benger overcame the handicap of starting with only 10 men and falling behind to an early goal against The Horse and Groom at a very wet Stanley Park to win 3-2.

The first 20 minutes saw Horse and Groom take the game to the home side as they looked to make their one-man advantage count. Even so it was a bit of a surprise when their right back Scott Brown brought the ball forward and let fly with a 30 yarder into the top corner to give the visitors the lead.

Benger steadied the game and once they were up to full strength with the late arrival of James Pope they began to dominate the remainder of the first half. For a period of about 20 minutes at the end of the half, Benger peppered the visitors' goal but their goalkeeper was having an outstanding game. Five minutes before half-time, Steve Gawke sent over a corner from the left which was headed back into the box by Rob Kent and Chris Miles stabbed the ball home and level the scores.

Shortly afterwards, Gawke sent over another corner which saw the ball ricochet around the box and Chris Rawlings thought he had scored but unfortunately for Benger the ref blew his whistle for half-time just before the ball struck the net.

But Rawlings was not to be denied and early in the second half he gave Benger the lead after good work down the left by Tom Birch and Chris Miles saw the ball played inside to James Pope. He flicked it into Rawlings' path and Benger's top scorer put just enough weight on his shot to get the ball over the line to make it 2-1.

Playing with the elements in their favour the visitors resorted mostly to a long ball pumped down the middle and although Benger tucked their full backs inside to help counteract this, it was from one of these attacks that Martin Cox gathered a flick-on and calmly tucked the ball beneath the home goalkeeper to level things up at 2-2.

With 25 minutes to go, Benger looked most likely to score the winner but the visitors' keeper made excellent saves to deny Chris Leonard and Paul Watson.

Horse and Groom had chances at the other end but found goalkeeper Andy Best in top form.

In the 75th minute, Horse and Groom had John Fenwick dismissed for a second yellow card and now it was Benger's turn to play with the extra man and it looked like they would take the points. Sure enough a few minutes later there was another scramble in the visitors' box with Benger sending in shot after shot and finally the ball fell to centre half Rob Kent who scooped it home from 10 yards out to give them a 3-2 lead.

Horse and Groom nearly netted an equaliser when a goal bound shot just nicked Steve Gawkes knee and deflected upwards and away off the crossbar.

Biddestone Arms thought that their game against an understrength Pig and Whistle United side might have been in doubt at Cuttle Lane but it survived the rain and the hosts claimed a 3-0 win to earn a fourth successive victory and leave the visitors with their first loss in six games.

After a fairly uneventful first 20 minutes it was Biddestone who picked up the pace and they took the lead after 25 minutes when Paul Dixon delivered a pinpoint cross to Richard Chaffey who powered home a bullet header.

Ten minutes later Biddestone increased their lead when Paul Dixon popped up on the left hand side and his free kick seemed to fox the United keeper who could only watch the ball as it hit the bottom right corner. Biddestone should have increased their lead through Andy Davis but his shot sailed high over the bar.

Biddestone did not have it all their own way and United came close to pulling a goal back when Mark Dalgney in the Arms goal had to pull off an excellent save to deny United.

Pig and Whistle started much brighter in the second half and for the first 20 minutes made Biddestone defend resolutely and constantly threatened to get themselves back in the game. They forced another great save from Dalgney, who was in fine form. Biddestone could and should have increased their lead further when striker Davis was again guilty of another wasted chance, but Chaffey was again Biddestone's key man when after some fine work by Paul Dixon on the right Chaffey blasted the ball home to make the final score 3-0.

Southwick Sports ended a run of four defeats with a 3-0 victory away at FC Bradford. Jamie Alford opened the scoring for Southwick with a well taken goal and made it 2-0 prior to the interval. Another goal in the second half saw him complete a deserved hat-trick.

The only fixture to fall foul of the weather in the division was at Sands Lane, Rowde, where The Crown Devizes were due to meet Trowbridge based Ship FC who have played just one league game in 2007.