THE wheels finally fell off the Leigh RMI promotion bandwagon when they went down 2-1 to promotion rivals Farsley at Hilton Park last night.

It was only their second league defeat at home this season but the warning bells have been ringing for several weeks with only two wins in the last 12 games and five points gained out of a possible 21.

To make matters worse manager Steve Waywell wasn't at the game because of a back injury and there appeared to be a lack of leadership off the field, especially when Farsley scored what turned out to be the winner in the 70th minute.

When RMI finally made a substitution, bringing on an extra striker, there were only eight minutes left. It was a case of too little too late and the Yorkshiremen leapfrogged Leigh to move into third.

Skipper Mark Schofield, who was pushed forward in the last few minutes in a desperate bid salvage a point, admitted changes should have been made sooner.

He said: "You see things differently from the sidelines but I'm sure Steve would have acted sooner. But having been on level terms at the break after playing into a gale, I fully expected us to go on and win it but we didn't create a single chance in the second half."

Leigh opened the scoring in the 17th minute when Dave Rydings collected a poor clearance from goalkeeper Paul Allen to set up Keith Evans for his 16th goal of the season.

Farsley equalised on the half hour when Paul Wheeler headed Paul Stevenson's left wing cross past Dave Felgate into his own goal.

And then Felgate, who had been saved twice by the woodwork earlier, failed to collect a Nigel Smith cross and Calvin Allen sealed the points with a header from close range.

"It is a bad result for us but we are still in with a shout and there's still plenty of football left in the season yet," added Schofield.

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