FREE-scoring Ludlow Town Colts continued their dominance of Herefordshire Division One by hitting another rival for six – but boss Scott Mackenzie says his defence are the unsung heroes of the club’s title charge.

On a weekend where the weather put paid to every other Division One game, Ludlow stretched their advantage at the top to five points by walloping Wellington Colts 6-1.

Ludlow have now averaged more than five goals a game this season, netting 74 times in 14 league matches but Mackenzie is just as pleased with their defensive record, by far the best in the division.

He said: “Our strikers are in form and we keep going on about them but, to tell the truth, my defence has been absolutely rock solid all season.

“The goalscorers get a lot of credit and rightly so but my back four, whomever has played in there, have been outstanding.

“A clean sheet has been evading us lately and we desperately want one but the defence has given us such a great platform to build from.”

Colts visit lowly Holme Lacy Reserves this weekend and Mackenzie says there will be no complacency as his side continue to chase an unbeaten season.

The boss added: “You never quite know which players teams are going to field so we will take nothing for granted and we have a couple of players missing too.

“We want to go unbeaten but our main goal is to win the title – we don’t care how we do it.”

Ludlow opened the scoring after 16 minutes on Saturday as great work by Simon Bradley and Dan Crowther set up Jabez Smith to fire home.

Wellington’s best spell of the game followed, missing one golden chance from eight yards before equalising with a screamer into the top corner.

That triggered a Ludlow response as the hosts regained the lead within two minutes, Smith dummying a Kieran Dovey cross for Bradley to drill home.

But they were fortunate to take the lead into the interval as Wellington hit the post after pouncing on a rogue backpass from Dovey.

If the first half was even, the second half was a completely different, one-sided, affair and Ludlow never looked back once Dovey set up Smith for his second goal to make it 3-1.

Bradley put Dan Griffiths through on goal to make it 4-1 on 65 minutes before substitute Jack Gittoes made it five and set up Crowther to net the sixth.

Wellington were one of only two sides to take points off Ludlow previously this season but Colts avenged that slight blemish to give Mackenzie the perfect gift on his 50th birthday.

He added: “In the first half, the wind favoured them and it was backs to the wall at times but we hit them on the break a couple of times and in the second half we were a lot stronger.

“It was a lovely birthday present!”