Four clubs - Farnworth, Eagley, Astley Bridge and Westhoughton - have secured their places in the top section of the Bolton League Second XI for the second half of the season.

The last two places will be between Lostock and Little Hulton (who meet this weekend), Horwich RMI and Tonge.

Farnworth are romping away at the top with their latest win, by seven wickets against Kearsley, taking them 24 points clear of second-placed Eagley.

Simon Harrison starred with the ball for Farnworth, taking 6-29 to help bowl out Kearsley for 126 with only Neil Thompson (22) and Jake Whittle (21) making a real fist of it.

Michael Daley, with 44, Kian Rogerson (34) and Shujat Ali (26 not out) then saw their side home with time to spare.

Eagley’s chase of Farnworth suffered a setback as they went down by 16 runs at Astley Bridge.

The home side batted first and despite Ady Cooper making 27, Jamie Cooper 33 and Ishy Patel 41, they were restricted to 150-8 with Luca Doyle taking 3-30.

Doyle then added an unbeaten 20, but even though Tom Mitchell added 25, Craig Faulkner chipped in with 20 and Ryan Garner 34, Eagley were restricted to 134-8 with Ady Cooper taking 3-31 as Bridge joined Westhoughton on 51 points.

Westhoughton bounced back to form as they hammered neighbours Lostock by an impressive 123 runs at St George’s Oval.

Jamie McAndrew, with 67, and Phil Wakefield (70) together with 27 from James Burrow helped them reach an impressive 217-6.

Liam Morrell then helped himself to 3-14 as Lostock subsided to just 94 all out in reply.

Tonge’s hopes of climbing into the top six suffered a blow as they suffered a three-wicket defeat at the hands of Blackrod last week.

Rob Tully, with 58, and Jav Bhagat (21) led the way as they batted first but Nikhail Patel (4-25) and George Purdham (3-26) helped restrict their total to 152.

Callum Fenton then took 4-28 to try and drag Tonge back into the game, but Matt Baty had other ideas making an undefeated 61 with Daniel Cooke adding 23 to secure a win for the home side.

It was a similar story for Horwich RMI who were well beaten at Victory Road by Little Lever.

Lever batted first and posted a very handy 192, thanks in the main to Simon Anderton (57), Ryan Worden (26), Tim Taylor (22) and Callum Hill (21) in spite of Will Pennington taking 3-38.

Other than Andy Hancock, with 22, RMI’s batsmen had little answer to the bowling of Myles Hayhurst (5-42) and Hill, who added 4-47 to his earlier runs and they were bowled out for 133 in reply.

Walkden made the day’s highest total as they thumped the Atherton bowling for an imposing 243-9, despite the best efforts of Tom Mather who returned 5-67 for the home side.

Imran Ali (91), Norman Khalid (50) and Haroon Abbassi (22) made the bulk of Walkden’s runs.

Dale Tyrer made an unbeaten 22 but the rest of the Atherton batting was destroyed by a devastating spell of 8-27 by Adnan Khan, which included a spell of four wickets in four balls as they collapsed to 91 all out.

The final game of the day saw Farnworth Social Circle coast to a six-wicket victory over Little Hulton.

Having bowled out the villagers for 103, Circle eased home with plenty of overs to spare with Keane Mulligan making an unbeaten 40 and Liam Ashworth 29 to see them home, even though Neil Jarvis took 3-18.

Bradley Barrow, with a very impressive 7-23, proved far too much for most of the Little Hulton batsmen as only Roger Kumah (29), Harrison Calvert (23) and Ellis Pearson managed to reach double figures.