THE one Forest football match to maintain the great tradition of the Boxing Day local derby again served up a fascinating morning of competitive football before a large crowd at Broadwell.

Living up to their superior league position, Broadwell played with greater assurance and confidence and deserved their win.

Lydbrook's Wayne Lewis thought it all rested on a brilliant save by Broadwell keeper Josh Loade.

"It came just before half-time. Josh pulled off a really good save and had we scored then we would have gone into the break all square at 3 - 3. Anything might have happened then but, to be fair, Broadwell had the better of the second-half and confirmed their superiority with a penalty," he said.

Lewis thought Lydbrook played their best football in the first-half when they scored twice through Kerry Hale.

"Both sides tried to play football and it was a good and very competitive game. The clubs get on very well and we try to keep the tradition of a Boxing Day game going. It will be our turn to host them at Lydbrook next year," said Lewis.

The Wyesiders, he says, are still in the process of rebuilding their team and have stuttered this season as a result of being unable to field a settled team.

However the experience of captain Simon Holland and the steady and reliable form of Tom Creed have assisted with the development of a number of young players such as Grant Lawrence, Ryan Wilks and Ryan Clarke.

"It's a highly competitive league and a couple of wins can dramatically change your position. At the moment we are in the bottom half of the table but if we can see off a couple of the teams around us we can climb pretty rapidly. I'm confident that with a more settled team we can go into the New Year with high hopes of a much better run of results," said Lewis.