Hayes & Yeading’s penultimate home Capital League fixture saw a stubborn Windsor & Eton side finally beaten to push United to within a point of leaders Harrow Borough as we enter the final stretch.

Manager Paul Hughes had three new faces in his side in the shape of Chris Clark at right-back and Dean Wallace in midfield both whom have come through the youth system at Wycombe and David Pitt up front who came through the youth ranks at Brentford.

It was indeed striker Pitt who fired the first shot in anger as he hit a fierce drive from the left side of the Windsor area that keeper Mark Banfry did very well to push away, Josh Andrew returned the ball into the mix but Pitt fired over from 12 yards.

Minutes later a scramble in the United area saw the ball fall nicely to Geoff Nalumoso on the edge of the box and he hit a shot that only just cleared the United goal.

The two sides seemed to cancel each other out in midfield for a lengthy spell until the deadlock was finally broken in the 34th minute. Andrejs Štolcers played a neat exchange with Andrew before taking the ball into the six yard box and firing across Banfry from an acute angle, the ball going into the Windsor net off the far post.

The final chance of the half fell to the visiting Stags when Ben Brown sprayed a lovely ball to Arthur Syla on the right and he hit a first time shot that Chris Baker needed two attempts to get into his grasp.

United started the second half quickly and could have scored again just 22 seconds in when Pitt received the ball from Alex Duffy and seemed to dance his way around three tackles before getting too close to Banfry and the kepper was able to block his shot.

Then almost out of nothing the Stags levelled the scores when Brown hit a dipping volley from all of 35 yards that flew over Baker, hit the underside of the bar, before bouncing up into the roof of the net.

Within seconds Pitt was on the run again, this time being denied a shot by a superb chase and tackle from Windsor defender Matt Mooney. By now Pitt was proving to be a real thorn in Windsor’s side, having picked up a throughball from Štolcers he passed Mooney before making room for a shot that Banfry pushed away diving to his left.

As if dealing with Pitt’s quick feet was not enough, manager Paul Hughes threw Daniel Wishart into the fray and this proved a key change as within four minutes he had played an integral part in creating two United goals.

Less than a minute in a collected a pass of the left from the impressive debutant Wallace, he cut the ball back to Pitt who sidestepped a challenge before laying the ball to an unmarked Andrew who fired home from 8 yards.

Three minutes later Wishart with back to goal controlled a pass on his chest before played in Pitt who took a touch and fired powerfully under the advancing Banfry for his maiden United goal.

With United now pretty much in control of proceedings not surprisingly all the real openings came their way. Wishart broke away again on the left, this time he tried his luck but Banfry gathered at the second attempt. Pitt then went very close to a second when he fired across the face and just wide of the far post.

The final chances came ten minutes from the end when Brown tried another from distance for the visitors but this time his effort was wide, and at the other end Wishart got his head to a Wallace centre but again this went wide of the target.

Report by Kevin Watts.

United Man of the Match: Alex Duffy.