BRITISH Rail took another step towards collecting the Oxford & District League Division 1 trophy by beating Forum A 8-2.

Richard Taylor was the star with a maximum. This included a victory over Karl Bushell, who defeated Darren Jones and Neil Cartwright for Forum’s only successes.

Second-placed Forum B followed BR’s lead and grabbed all four points with a 9-1 success over Vikings A with maximums for Fraser Harris and Andrew Flint.

Bicester A won by the same margin over two-man Forum D with maximums for Tony Gorman and Jason Tustain.

In Division 2, Forum E defeated Gladiators A 8-2.

Farshad and Kiarash Shaddel won all three, but John Ho finally came unstuck, losing to Mark Penn and Paul Knight – his first defeats of the season.

Vikings C moved up to second by demolishing their D team 10-0.

Vikings B drew 5-5 with Begbroke. Paul Borrowdale saved Vikings from a loss by inflicting a rare defeat on Paul Humphrey.

Forum H created daylight at the top of Division 3 by defeating nearest challengers, Bicester C, 9-1.

John Duncalfe and Tak-Wa Yau claimed trebles, but Stan Harding beat Maurice Chambers for Bicester’s win.

OXFORD & DISTRICT LEAGUE RESULTS

Div 1: Forum A 2, British Rail 8 (R Taylor 3); Forum D 1, Bicester A 9 (T Gorman 3, J Tustain 3); Vikings A 1, Forum B 9 (F Harris 3, A Flint 3).

Div 2: Bicester B 7 (J Felton 3), Forum F 3; Begbroke 5, Vikings B 5 (P Borrowdale 3); Forum E 8 (F Shaddel 3, K Shaddel 3), Gladiators A 2; Vikings C 10 (C Savage 3, J Speedy 3, S Tabuni 3), Vikings D 0.

Div 3: Bicester E 3, Forum J 7 (E Carter 3, M Jedrzejowski 3); Bicester C 1, Forum H 9 (J Duncalfe 3, T Yau 3; Holton A 4, Holton B 6.