Hockey: Davies' driving force

MANDY DAVIES, who narrowly missed out on selection for Great Britain's Olympic squad, was the dominant force in First Personnel Sutton Coldfield's convincing 3-0 win against Leicester Balsam in Saturday's National League match at Cannock, writes Bill Colwill.

Davies, cashing in on careless errors in the Leicester defence, set up first-half goals for Fionnuala McCarthy and Jane Swinnerton, before Swinnerton dived in to get a touch to Jackie Hill's free hit late in the second half.

Ipswich maintained their three- point lead, thanks to a 17th- minute penalty-corner goal from Tracy Fry and another splendid goalkeeping performance from Jo Thompson, in a narrow 1-0 win against Ealing.

Slough held on to second place after their 4-0 win at Chelmsford, where goals came from Denise Shorney (2), Sam Wright and Kate Parker. Tina Cullen's two in Hightown's 2-0 win against Pickwick kept her side in third place and made her the league's leading goalscorer with eight.

Claire Windle scored Doncaster's first goal of the season but did no more than equalise Angela Thorne's for Exmouth in a 1-1 draw which gave the Devon side their first points of the season but did little to relieve their relegation problems.

Allison Burrows's goal for Trojans in their 1-0 home win against Harleston Magpies moved them three points clear at the top of the Second Division, with Sherwood taking advantage of Blueharts' 1-0 defeat at Bracknell to move into second place after beating Yate

2-0 with goals from Joy Gillard and Heather Baker.