With Leek going all out to secure their slot in the play offs, Clitheroe only had pride and a possible shirt for next season to play for. That said, Clitheroe matched their high flying opponents but were undone by their season long Achilles’ heel of making a handful of catastrophic errors in dangerous positions early in the game.

Leek had Ben Purdham back pedalling as early as the first minute, but with Max Hazeldine up front, the Blues had sufficient fire power to make chances of their own, on 11 minutes, Hazeldine went down the left, muscled past his defender and whistled his shot just over the bar. Two minutes later, Hazeldine turned provider, with Phil Marsh scooping the ball wide of goal when his shot had to be on target. On 17 minutes should have been behind when from a short Clitheroe corner, Hyuga Tanner lost the ball inside the opposition half leaving three forwards and one defender haring towards Purdham’s goal. Amazingly, the striker hit the outside of the post. Four minutes later, a Purdham clearance from a hopeful Leek punt was charged down and the ball squirted for a corner. From the resultant deep corner, the Leek skipper powered home his header. The rest of the half was shaded by Leek, but Clitheroe were still in the game.

The second half was all Clitheroe, but with a characteristic lack of cutting edge. Marsh had an overhead kick on 49 minutes go close, and late on in the half Josh Gregory had a header flash across the goal from a Michael Wilson cross. Other than that, Leek were happy to soak up the moderate pressure and pocket the three points.

Team : Ben Purdham, Michael Wilson, Cole Lonsdale, Alex Low, Andy Langford, Jay Jeffries, Bevan Burey, Hyuga Tanner, Phil Marsh (Antoine Recizac), Max Hazeldine, Jacob Gregory (c) (Josh Gregory). Subs - Antoine Recizac, Josh Gregory. Not used - Ryan Botell, Cameron Terry.