One moment of quality was all Bashley needed to push Hampshire rivals Fleet Town further into the relegation mire at the Recreation Ground on Saturday.

The 54th-minute winner was literally an 'in your face' finish from Richard Gillespie, who was shoved onto the ball, face first, by ex-Bash defender Neil Morant as he attempted to head in Chris Ferrett's inviting left-wing cross.

It was the 20-year-old Romsey lad's 32nd goal of a prolific season - and the only decent chance the Foresters mustered all afternoon.

Fleet, in contrast, were left rueing a string of wasted opportunities that a player of Gillespie's prowess would doubtless have buried.

As Fleet skipper Andy Darnton, a former Bashley stalwart, put it: "If we'd had Gilly on our side, we'd probably have won the game four or five-one.

"We had several chances to wrap it up, but we couldn't put them away. I thought we'd managed Gilly quite well until he scored."

You couldn't help but feel sorry for the luckless north Hampshire side.

After a meagre return of six points from their previous 14 league games, they got virtually everything right against Bashley, apart from the finishing.

David Ocquaye set the tone after just two minutes. Bashley surrendered possession cheaply, but with all the time and space in the world, the former Kingstonian frontrunner unwisely chose to lift his shot over Foresters' keeper David Elm and managed to clear the bar too.

Although Bash defended doggedly, they were a non-existent attacking force in the first half and, after a couple of Fleet half-chances, another golden opportunity arose for Ocquaye on 42 minutes.

This time he was picked out by Phil Archbold, unmarked on the right of the area, but wastefully lashed an angled shot over.

Although Bash boss Geoff Butler admitted: "We were a disgrace in the first half," he didn't rant and rave in the dressing room.

"The back four of Chris Ferrett, Matt Parnell, Phil Proudley and Paul Gazzard - plus Elmo in goal - were exempt from any criticism, but I simply said to the rest that if they didn't have pride in their own ability and performance, that was up to them, but it couldn't be right that Fleet's goalkeeper didn't have a single save to make," he said.

Consciences pricked, Bash upped the tempo in the second half but were indebted to their excellent skipper Ferrett for a goalline clearance from Ocquaye in the 53rd minute.

Within a flash, the former Bournemouth, Fleet, Basingstoke and Havant full-back was on the attack at the other end, conjuring up the inch-perfect cross from which Gillespie bagged the winner.

Butler explained: "We lost Andy Culliford at half-time with a groin problem and had to go to three at the back and push Chris Ferrett forward - that's what got us the goal.

"Chris has been excellent this season. I can count the number of poor games he's had on my two thumbs.

"He's a quality professional and a quality fella. We're fortunate to have him. For his sake, I wish we had another ten like him. He deserves to play in a side that has a chance of winning things.

"When you look at who finished the game for us today, it's a magnificent result for us. Phil Proudley and Darren Head are out of the reserves, we got Gary Langrish from Dorchester's reserves and James Totczyk is only 16.

"We've lost Chris Knowles in the warm-up and Andy Culliford should never have declared himself fit. The fact he did shows he wants to help the cause, but he shouldn't."

To their credit, Fleet didn't give the Bash defence a moment's peace as they poured forward in search of an equaliser. Jermaine Hamilton headed one decent chance over before substitute Pete Murphy swerved a cracking shot just past the foot of the post.

Then, as the game spilled into stoppage time, Elm brilliantly tipped Bernie Asante's powerful angled drive over the bar to send Paul Holden's men home empty-handed.

Bash will argue that Fleet were lucky to end up with 11 men on the pitch. Two minutes from the end of normal time the pacy Gillespie was clean through only for Fleet's South African full-back Donovan Chislett to hook out a leg and trip him, but nothing was given.

The result leaves Fleet floundering one place above the drop zone and facing an uphill battle to avoid relegation to the Wessex League.

Darnton said: "We've got home games against Ashford (Wednesday) and Newport (Saturday) coming up this week and they're going to be crucial."