Wootton Bassett gave their push for a top half in Swindon and District League Division Five a boost by beating Abbey Meads F 43-17 at the weekend.

The two teams went into the game occupying positions next to each other in the table, and Bassett pushed hard from the outset as they looked to get their noses in front early on.

It was not long before they did just that as a mixture of fast attacking third passes from Kara Bottomley and accurate, long and short range shots by their experienced shooters Stacey Watson and Kath Young helped give Bassett a 20-9 lead at half time.

After a uplifting half time pep talk by their coach Helen Glasgow, the players came running onto the pitch ready for the second half.

The third quarter saw the defensive team of Shirley Legge and Louise Selway stop an attacking Abbey Meads and move the ball back to the offensive players quickly with the help of Holly Woodridge playing wing defence for the first time.

During the third quarter the Wootton Bassett captain Kirsty Freeth went over on her ankle and had to be taken off to recover. After a brief injury stop, play continued and Freeth was replaced by Dawn Robbins.

But despite the loss of their captain, Bassett did enough to seal an ultimately comfortable victory.

With two matches remaining in the season - one against the division leaders Devizes and the other against the strong Nationwide C team - Wootton Bassett will have their work cut out to continue their current form.

“It was a great win from Bassett and I'm a very proud captain right now,” said Freeth after the game.

Meanwhile, Abbey Meads D sealed a 39-13 win over a battling Fairford D side to boost their promotion aspirations. Both teams started slowly and the first goal was not scored until after five minutes, but after that the points started to trickle in and by the second half, the shooting teams for both sides had warmed up.

Fortunately for Abbey, the attacking combination of Christina Barrow, Susan Maggs, Emily Wilson and Nat Cole were formidable and Fairford had to really fight to stay in the game.

By the third quarter, Abbey had managed to increase the lead from five goals in each of the first two quarters to eight.

Sian Waite, Amanda Rossiter and Nicola Gilhespy stayed focussed throughout the game and were almost impenetrable in defence.

Finally, Abbey Meads E just managed to scrape together the bare minimum of seven players for their match on Saturday.

Abbey were strong from the beginning and were 20-1 ahead by half time despite making some silly mistakes down the court from trying to rush the game.

But everyone defended well on the whole and some great interceptions were made, while the accurate shooting continued. Ultimately it was a comfortable win for Abbey as the game ended 48-2 in their favour.