Yorkshire Amateur League

Championship Division

Saturday 28th May 2022

Kick Off 14.00 On Time !

Lepton Highlanders 3 Leeds City Reserves 2, attendance 175

3’ 1-0

16’ 2-0

26’ 2-1

52’ 2-2

80’ 3-2

@ Lepton Highlanders Sports & Social Club

Wakefield Road

Lepton

HD8 0LX

No Admission

£2 Programme, 8 pages.

This was the last match to be played in this division (third tier of the league, Step 9) and was a winner takes all as far as the league title went. It was 1st versus 3rd, and with just two promotion places available, it meant all three possible results would see a different outcome in both who took the title and who would end up in a higher division next season. Lepton Highlanders were on 48 points (+56 Goal Difference), as were second placed Woodkirk Valley (+ 29 GD), with Leeds City (+ 40 GD) a point further back.

Lepton got off to the perfect start, opening the scoring after just three minutes and we were only sixteen minutes in when they made it 2-0, beating the ’keeper at his near post, with an effort that really should have been saved. Ten minutes later the visitors pulled a goal back, shooting through the ’keeper’s legs, after a cross from the right wasn’t cleared. Seven minutes into the second half it was 2-2, after a poor punch clear by the ’keeper was lobbed back over him from the angle of the 18 yard box, going in off the far post. With ten minutes left Lepton netted the winner, cutting in from the right, before smashing the ball into the roof of the net. During the goal celebrations, one of their players suffered a suspected dislocated knee cap. An ambulance was called, but with none available, they were advised to get him into a car and drive him to hospital themselves! Surprisingly, we only had a seventeen minute delay, whilst the player was loaded into the car and taken away.

So Lepton take the title, and are promoted along with Woodkirk Valley, who finished second.