ANDY Fane hopes victory against Tottington United will kick start Little Lever’s season.

Despite playing 35 minutes with just 10 men after centre-half Phil Regan was sent off, the Mytham Road men overcame their rivals 2-1 in the local derby thanks to a brace from Scott Bingham.

And following three Premier Division defeats on the bounce, the assistant manager was pleased with his side’s dominant performance.

“Having started the season relatively well we’ve been in a bit of a dip recently,” said Fane.

“We’ve been poor in the last four or five games so it was good to get back on track with a thoroughly deserved win.

“Hopefully this can kick start our season a bit now.”

In poor conditions, the wind helped gift Tottington the opening goal early in the first half when Dan Holland’s long ball upfield deceived home goalkeeper Ste Housley and it bounced over his head and into the net.

This seemed to galvanise Little Lever and they started to play some good football.

The hosts equalised before half time with Scott Bingham on the scoresheet with a well-taken goal into the bottom corner from 12 yards.

Regan was dismissed early in the second half forcing Lever into changes but Bingham’s deflected shot clinched the victory.

“The lads reacted fantastically well to going down to 10 men and they all worked really well for each other,” he said.

“It was a bit of a lucky winning goal but it was a well deserved.

“Tottington are a well-organised team but they didn’t pose us too much of a threat going forward.

“It’s always nice to get one over a Bury side.”

Despite the victory, Little Lever remain 14 points behind league leaders Failsworth Dynamos.

“I don’t expect us to be challenging the top two for the title,” he said.

“I think Failsworth and Old Bolts will fight it out between themselves.

“But if we can keep pushing on and do something in the cup and get a good run going, you never know.”

Third-placed Little Lever are at home to 11th-placed Old Mancunians on Saturday but Fane is not taking anything for granted against the league strugglers.

“We played North Walkden a few weeks ago and they turned us over.

“Old Mancs are a tough outfit and always give us a good game.

“If we play like I know we can then I think we’ll beat them.”

A lack of games proved Horwich St Mary’s Victoria’s downfall when they lost 1-0 at Failsworth Dynamos.

Fifth-placed Horwich, who could have gone above Mostonians in fourth with a win, were undone by a lack of match fitness.

“We were just a bit ring rusty with us not playing regularly,” admitted manager Danny Holmes.

“You could see we were lacking a bit of match fitness.”

The hosts, who went top of the table with the victory, scored the only goal of the game in the first half.

Matthew Makinson hit the bar for Horwich before the break and the visitors wasted several other half chances in the second half as they fell to their first defeat since November.

“We lost possession in midfield and they’ve just gone on and finished the move,” said Fane.

“If we could have gone in at the break at 1-1, I think the result would have been different.

“Lewis Haydock put in a good performance for us. He put in a couple of quality crosses into the box but we were just unable to get on the end of them.

“Apart from those half chances we didn’t really test the Failsworth keeper. It was a disappointing result but to be fair to Failsworth they were the better side. The best side won.”

Horwich have another untimely scheduled break on Saturday before hosting Failsworth again in the reverse fixture on February 13.

“It’s disappointing that we haven’t got a game this week because we really need to get back to playing regularly.

“You could tell we were a bit off the pace.

“Failsworth are a good footballing side but our pitch is much smaller and tighter than they the 4G pitch they are used to, so hopefully that will work to our advantage.”

Old Boltonians slipped to second place in the table after their game at Rochdale St Clements was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch.

Breightmet United’s home game with Hollinwood in Division One of the FBT Manchester League was also called off.