Skipton - After last week's disappointment Skipton were fired up for their visit to Adel in Leeds. Only a win would guarantee promotion and a superb frist half hat-trick from Mary Morris, her eleventh of the season, virtually settled the result.

The first goal arrived after five minutes of continued pressure when Morris picked up a loose ball in the D and pushed it wide of the keeper.

The pressure continued and Morris scored the second from a well-rehearsed short corner move after being supplied with a pass from man of the match Sam Smith. Adel struggled to live with the pace of Skipton's game but did try to push forward. Morris scored her hat-trick in and 37th league goal (in 18 games) in typical fashion after taking on several defenders before beating the keeper.

After half time Skipton kept up the pressure winning several corners and more chances. Jackie Abbot finished from close range to make it 4-0 and secure promotion. The performance of the whole side throughout the season has been outstanding.

Skipton have scored more goals and conceded fewer than any other team in the league. It is not really fair to single out an individual for praise but the goal scoring of Mary Morris has been truly awesome. Most sides in the league knew of her ability and tried to mark her out of the game, which makes the achievement even more remarkable.

Airedale Men

Needing only three points to gain promotion and with four matches remaining Airedale now have two more matches and still need three points.

At home to second from bottom Roundwood, Airedale lacked shape, pace and ideas. Roundwood enhanced by their recent merger with Rotherham played with a strong desire to win and secured a 3-0 victory.

Chapletown who are also battling for promotion could only manage a 3-3 draw with Hull YPI which left them fourpoints adrift of Airedale. David Browns thrashed Acomb 3-0 to match Airedale for points but are 14 goals behind on goal difference and only have one game remaining.

Airedale's Sunday visit to Chapletown couldn't have started worse, when top goal scorer Nick Pedley wet to hospital with a suspected broken collar bone leaving Airedale to use two juniors to fill in.

Chapletown started well determined to gain the points to keep them in the promotion stakes. A free hit on the edge of Airedale's D allowed them to set up their first goal after 10 minutes. Airedale applied more pressure and five minutes from the break a similar situation at the other end of the field allowed Richard Stewart to deflect the ball past the Chapletown keeper, but the umpires didn't believe the striker and disallowed the goal.

Airedale were under the cosh for a long period early in the second half. Several breakaway chances were squandered and while pushing for the equaliser Airedale left space at the back. Chapletown's young centre forward took on the defence and unleashed an incredible reverse stick shot that found the top right had corner and secured a 2-0 victory.

P W D L F A Pts

Slazengers 21 18 2 1 69 13 56

Airedale 20 12 2 6 57 33 38

David Brown 21 11 5 5 35 25 38

Chapeltown 21 11 4 6 63 41 37

Acomb 21 9 5 7 47 42 32

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.