THE pressure is on for Breightmet United after their 6-0 thumping of Hindley Juniors on Saturday.

But it is all coming from within the club, and manager Paul Roberts, who will settle for nothing less than promotion this season.

There was disappointment at Moss Park last season as, despite finishing 14th in the 19-team Division One, restructuring to the Manchester League four divisions meant Breightmet were demoted to Division Two.

And with just two promotion places up for grabs this time around, a return to Division One is harder than ever for the club.

But Roberts insists there is more than enough talent at the club to win a promotion place this term and he is bullish about their chances of success.

“We have made no secret of the fact that promotion is our focus, completely,” he said. “I’m putting pressure on the players and on myself, definitely, but it’s taken us a couple of years but we feel we’ve got a strong squad and one that can win promotion, we’re confident of that.

“It’s not going to be easy, of course, but we’ve got to deliver. We’ve lost one or two good players this year but brought a few in and we think we’re strong, it’s lads who have bought into what we’re trying to achieve.

“Jason Brooks has had a season out of the game so he’s still getting back up to speed but there are definitely goals in him, and Aussie Preston Daniel who was with Prestwich Heys, is another very welcome addition.

“We have two Romanian lads too, Andrei Dragusin, who has that bit of extra quality, and Dragos Barbu, who was man-of-the-match on Saturday, filling in for our captain Osman Karacan, in the centre of defence.”

Breightmet’s latest win, courtesy of hat-tricks for Gary McShane and Scott Lock – who began the afternoon at left-back – took them to second in the table, behind Tintwistle.

And Roberts will continue to set his side high standards, and wants to cut the number of wasted opportunities, even though they have scored 12 times in three league games.

“We’ve got to be spot-on all season, we don’t know a lot about a lot of the new teams so we’ll just focus on ourselves and what we can do,” he said.

In the Premier Division Bolton County’s Tom Axon-Smith scored as they drew 1-1 with Walshaw Sports.